Out from Deep Waters
by RunwithscissorsXXXbattlescars
Summary: Life happens and Kululu and Fuyuki suddenly become stranded on a deserted island with little hope of escape. As they struggle to survive Mother Nature (an especially hard task for the both of them), certain experiences lead them to various realizations about each other and themselves. *no romance* - COMPLETE -
1. Prologue

**THANK YOU SUMMER! Yes, it's finally summer vacation for me, and this is my first present to you guys. I'm planning to update Pekopon Revolution as well, though I don't know when.**

**Anyway, enjoy! I don't own Keroro Gunso.**

* * *

At first there had been daylight, but as impact was made, the light vanished, and the foamy sensation began entering his mouth.

There was no air. He felt like he was suffocating. He needed to get out, but couldn't. The darkness just went on forever. He struggled to resurface, kicking his limbs with all his might, but it was just like slow-motion. As if in a dream. As if it all was unreal. He didn't want to give up, but something deep down inside him sensed that there was no way out. This might be the end.

First he was being yanked by the waves, and then was pulled down, deeper and deeper. He began to drift lifelessly through the darkness, wondering where it would end. But his mind was frozen. All of him was.

Finally he let his eyes shut, as the choking enveloped him and all signs of breathing vanished.

* * *

Later he awoke on a beach. He didn't expect to awaken at all.

Someone with a blue head was positioned directly over him. As his vision began to focus, he realized who it was.

"…Fuyuki?" He quickly sat up. "What am I doing here?"

Fuyuki frowned and looked off to the side. "Um… the ship crashed…. Remember, Sergeant Major?"

In fact, Kululu did remember. They had been traveling to Mumbai when he realized that the gas tank of their ship was on fire, but by that point it was already too late. The ship began rapidly plummeting toward the ocean, and that were Kululu's only memories of the incident until it made impact with the water.

Something tugged at him from the back of his mind. If he recalled correctly….

"Wasn't I in the water?" he asked Fuyuki, although part of him expected the boy to not remember.

Fuyuki suddenly became silent. After a few prolonged moments, he gave a terse nod of his head.

"So how'd I get out?"

"I kind of had to drag you out…." He was now rubbing the back of his head.

"But you can't swim."

"You were pretty close to shore by that point."

"Then why couldn't I have gotten there myself?"

Kululu knew the answer, although he really didn't want to admit it. He just hoped Fuyuki wouldn't realize it, and instead think that he was unconscious or something.

"You were unconscious."

"Oh, really? Hm…."

"Wait, what?"

"Nothing…." Kululu paused. "…Was I really?"

"Yeah. You weren't breathing."

This was where Fuyuki became silent again.

Kululu was smart. It didn't take him long to put the pieces together.

"Wow, so, uh… I guess you saved my life and stuff, ku-ku."

All he did was nod. He didn't do much anyway. But CPR was too hard for him to learn (nor did he want to, after the life-o-pus incident), and even if they had one of those… things, it had scarred him the last time he saw it in actions…. Just his luck that something as simple as a slap on the back would make him cough up the water.

Kululu opened his mouth, about to utter his thanks, but Fuyuki had already walked off. The former kicked at the sand, disappointed at himself.

Fuyuki meanwhile was busy looking around in the bushes, climbing rocks by the shore, and scoping as far as he could see. He was trying to find where their ship had landed, but he saw no trace of it.

"Hey, Sergeant Major!" he called. "Do you remember where the ship fell?"

"Ku ku, no," he answered back. He walked up to where Fuyuki was towering on the rocks, casting a shadow across the sands that Kululu was now standing in. "The waves have probably already pulled it away, no doubt. Shame because if we knew where it was, I could possibly build a radio, and then we could be out of here, lickity-split. Ku ku…."

A sudden thought occurred to him. Fuyuki noticed this look on his face and looked down at him questioningly.

"Oh, I was just thinking how lucky we are…. If we were anyone else, we might not even be able to get off this island."

"Why is that?" asked Fuyuki.

"It's this wonderful thing called obsession, you see. Ku ku. Now tell me, Fuyuki, did you ever tell Momoka about where you were going?"

"No…. Why?"

"Hm. Oh, well, I'm sure that she'll find us in no time, anyway. Ku ku!"

"Why do you think that?" Fuyuki asked him.

Kululu just grinned back.

"In the meantime, we should find ourselves some food. It was a miracle that we landed somewhere in the tropics. Although we won't be here for long anyway, ku ku ku!"

Fuyuki scratched the back of his head and shrugged. Sometimes he didn't understand what was more of gibberish: Kululu's cynical laughter, or the actual words that came from his mouth.

Kululu was already walking off toward the trees, so Fuyuki decided it'd be best to come down also. Gripping a tight hand on the rocks, he realized this might not be as easy as he thought it would be. It was hard to find a proper foothold, and when he did, it was sharp as heck. Luckily, though, he was still wearing shoes. He stepped down on that foothold nevertheless, and searched for another with his other foot. Once both feet were closer to the ground, he let go of the handhold of his right hand, which still had the rough imprint of the rocks on it. He lowered it as far as he could to the ground, grabbed that part of the rock, and did the same thing with his left hand. After repeating this procedure multiple times, he was able to get to the ground while only stumbling and crashing once, which was at the end.

Thank goodness for whoever invented sand. …Unless that was by some alien too. Sand wasn't invented by an alien, was it? Because if so, that would be pretty awesome.

Fuyuki cleared away his thoughts, knowing that now was no time to be thinking of such things. Almost a quarter hour ago Kululu had told him to search for food, and he hadn't even started. Scrambling up from the sand, he made his way toward the trees.

Once surrounded by trees, it was actually pretty nice. The air was humid, sunlight splattered everywhere across the forest floor, and the moss made the place gleam a golden-green. It was quite beautiful. Fuyuki pressed forward, because they wouldn't be here so long anyway…. Whatever it was that Kululu meant by that.

Fruit, although it certainly wasn't everywhere, grow in abundances on the trees that he could find them on. Fuyuki began picking them, hoping that they weren't poisonous as he did so. It would sure suck if they were. What if the whole island was poisonous? What if the island was really a turtle? Actually, that would be pretty cool. Fuyuki imagined himself riding a giant turtle as it floated over countless waves, sea spray crashing onto his hair and the sunlight weaving through it. He had a smile on his face in that image.

But no, the island probably wasn't really a giant turtle. Fuyuki's smile left his face.

After gathering a copious amount of food, Fuyuki exited the trees and made his way back to the place where he had been climbing the rocks and talking to Kululu. He waited a while for Kululu to return, and when he didn't, his mind began searching uncontrollably for explanations. _Maybe he was attacked by savages. Or got caught in some kind of trap meant for an animal. Or he fell in a hole and can't get out. No—wait—what if Kululu __is__ the turtle?_

After about another five minutes, the yellow Keronian finally poked his head from out of the forest and drew himself out, a much smaller amount of food in his arms. It was easy to know why. Keronian arms were extremely small.

"Consider yourself lucky," Kululu said to him as he spread the fruits down upon a large leaf which he had placed on the ground, "that your body is more capable of this than mine. You have no idea how long it took to get around something as simple as a log!"

"I actually would've thought you'd have had better luck with uninhabited islands like these." Fuyuki spread his fruit down as well, secretly relieved at Kululu's return. "After all, you are the one who had that training island…."

"Yes, but that was artificial. This is a _real_ island." Kululu shut his eyes and crossed his arms. "People like me don't get along well with nature."

"I'm not too good with nature myself," Fuyuki admitted sheepishly. As he picked up a fruit to bite into, Kululu frowned.

"So, you mean, out of everyone I had to crash-land with, I ended up with _you_, who hates nature just about as much as I do?"

"Yup!" said Fuyuki.

Kululu thrust his head into his hands, hopeless. Now his only consolation was the belief that Momoka would soon come to rescue both of them, since she seemed to know where Fuyuki was at all times anyway.

"At least the fates could've let me crash with someone like Giroro-senpai instead." Through the cracks of his fingers he fed an angry glare at Fuyuki. "He would've known exactly what to do. Hell, he might even be overjoyed at the idea of this."

_Frankly I'd have rather crash-landed with the Corporal too,_ thought Fuyuki, biting his lip. He wouldn't tell Kululu that, of course. Who knew how long they would have to stay on that island—though according to what Kululu said, it wouldn't be long.

Still… the thought of having to spend time on a deserted island _alone_ with someone like Kululu was enough to send a shiver up his spine.

"How long do you think it'll be till someone finds us?" he asked.

"Hopefully not long. You have Momoka, after all. Once everyone realizes how long we're taking to return, they'll send a search party or something."

"How will they know that we're on _this_ island, though?"

Kululu took his chin in his hand. "Hm, you have a point there. I suppose we could build a signal fire."

Then again, if they did, that put them at risk of somebody else finding them, and since Kululu was an alien….

Shoot… he hoped his anti-barrier was still working.

He twisted it. No such luck—it was broken.

"What're you doing, Sergeant Major?"

"My anti-barrier is broken. We can build a signal fire, but if someone else happens to find us instead, then they'll see me. Also, if they're foreign to you, I won't be able to translate…."

"But I can still talk to you," he pointed out.

"Well, yes, Japanese isn't all that hard of a language to learn, ku-ku. The issue is with any other language, and that's what this guy helps with." He pointed to his anti-barrier insignia, an orange swirl.

"But can we still build a signal fire?"

"Ku ku ku, course we can. You know how to build a fire?"

Fuyuki smiled. "Yeah!" The smiled vanished. "Wait, no."

Kululu smacked his forehead onto his hand.

"Fires aren't that hard to build, though. As long as you have a piece of glass. Maybe a magnifying glass or something…. Hmmm…."

"All the glass we might find is in the ship," said Kululu. "And the ship is in the sea. There's always a chance of finding some sea glass by the shore, though. …Although I haven't seen any…."

Then what to do?

Fuyuki's eyes drifted to Kululu.

"…Sergeant Major?"

"Hng? Yeah?"

He began walking toward him. Finding this behavior rather odd, Kululu began taking slow steps backward.

"Wh-what are you doing, Fuyuki?"

He reached out his hand. It was then that Kululu realized it. He clamped his hands over the rims of his glasses.

"Oh, no you are not! You are _not_ taking these! This is the only pair left that I have!"

"I'm sorry, Sergeant Major. We need to build a signal fire!"

With that, Fuyuki whipped off Kululu's glasses.

"Oh wait, we probably need to put the fire together first. Hm…." While Kululu struggled about, trying to see, Fuyuki looked around, hoping to see a mountain. He finally rested his eyes on one, which was kind of obvious to see anyway, because, well, it was a mountain. Things like these were kind of hard to not notice.

"We can build the fire on top of there!" he realized. Brashly, Fuyuki began running off. After whipping out another pair of glasses, Kululu followed him.

Fuyuki had been in the process of gathering wood and kindling when Kululu had caught up. That hike up the mountain was a long one.

"Oh, Sergeant Major! Here, you can help me gather wood!—Wait…." Fuyuki looked at him strangely. "How do you have your glasses again?"

"Hm?"

"I thought you said you only had one pair."

"I lied, ku ku ku!"

Fuyuki frowned at him, dropping the next log down. "Well, it wasn't funny."

"Eh, neither was what you did." He grunted as Fuyuki tossed him some kindling, which, to Kululu, was quite heavy. He walked slowly over to the pile of logs and hoisted them on.

Fuyuki added the last log and exerted his breath. "There, I think that's good enough. Don't you think?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever," said Kululu, adjusting his glasses. The ones he actually had on his face.

It was time to light it. They both bent down as Fuyuki placed the other pair of glasses above the pile of wood, adjusting the angle it made toward the sky till the gleam of the sunlight reflected off it. They watched as smoke began to form in the center of the pile. After a few more seconds, a tiny little flame was born.

Fuyuki stood back and marveled at his work. "Wow! I made a fire come to life!"

"With _my_ glasses," Kululu corrected, snatching them away from the boy's hand and replacing them on his face. No use. They were damaged anyway with Fuyuki's fingerprints. Kululu sighed and took them off, putting on instead is other pair. For now he supposed they'd just use this pair for fire-starting.

"And now we wait," he said, resting his hands on his hips. "Until Momoka comes."

"Uh-huh," said Fuyuki. The fire began to blaze in front of them.

* * *

**Originally I had it that Fuyuki had to implement CPR on Kululu, until my sister pointed out that he doesn't know it. Nor would he have learned, since CPR is a very difficult thing to do. (She knows CPR.) So I changed it to just a slap-on-the-back instead, which somehow worked. Except Kululu doesn't know that yet.**

**Next chapter will be up whenever I finish writing it. But first I actually need to draw the cover image for this thing.**

**Update (7/24/13): Three things. First thing is that OH MY LORELEI I JUST MADE A FROWNEY FACE. Second thing is that woot, Giroro's birthday was yesterday! Third thing is that oh my god this is insane. So I just finished revising this thing, (I didn't add much, just fixed up a few spots here and there), and it's almost funny how silly I wrote a couple of things. Like when Kululu told Fuyuki that bees were only out at night. And when Kululu sat on a moth. Like. Ew. No, it was _moss_. I hate making typos.**

**Anyway , I hope you choose to read the rest of this story, despite its length (though probably not thaaaat long campared to SOME stories I've read XD I'm looking at you, Johnny Cadet), and I hope you enjoy!**


	2. A Trip to Mumbai

—_Flashback to that morning_—

"Fuyuki, it's for you!"

Fuyuki took the phone from his sister's hand and pressed his ear against it. "Hi, it's Fuyuki."

"Ah! Fuyuki-bro," said a familiar voice on the other end. "It's Yuusho! Remember me?"

"Yuusho-san? No way!" Fuyuki couldn't believe it. He had known Yuusho back in grade school, when they were both in the Occult Club. But recently he'd moved to Mumbai, so they'd lost touch.

"How are you doing?" asked Fuyuki.

"Great, great, but that's not what I've called about. You'll never believe it! The craziest thing happened."

Keroro's voice broke in from the background. "Fuyuki-dono, do you know where my screwdriver is!"

"Hold on a second, Yuusho-san.—No, Sarge! I don't know where it is!" Fuyuki uncovered his hand from the speaker-part of the phone. "Anyway, you were saying?"

"So, you know how I live in Mumbai now, right? Right. So there's this one apartment building here—nobody lives in it, so it's really creepy. But anyway, so last night some of my friends and I went there to go check it out, and then… and then…!"

"Fuyuuuuuki-donooooooo!"

"Hold on, Sarge! I'm talking to someone on the phone!—And then what?" asked Fuyuki.

"And then we saw this creepy white thing walk past us in one of the hallways…."

"Did you run?"

"Fu! Yu! Ki! Dono!" Keroro shouted again.

"Please hold on, Sarge!"

"No. We tried to follow it. And so we followed it into the next room, and—Who's over there with you?"

"Um, nobody," said Fuyuki.

"Oh. So anyway, we followed it into the next room, and it was gone suddenly," said Yuusho.

"It might've been a trick of the light…."

"Are you saying that ghosts aren't real?"

"What?—No, no!" Fuyuki laughed. "Of course not. I _definitely_ believe in ghosts."

Behind Fuyuki, Omiyo put down her baseball bat and drifted away.

"Oh, okay, good. Well, anyway, it doesn't end there!"

He waited for him to continue.

"So, after we went into that room and saw that the ghost wasn't there, we turned around back into the hallway and started walking some more. At some point, we passed another row of doors which, on the opposite wall, there was a stain. The thing was, we'd passed by that exact wall before, and there hadn't been a stain there."

"How do you know it was the same wall?" asked Fuyuki.

"Because I remember putting my gum on the frame of one of the doors there, that's why. And so we were all like, yeah, that's a bit creepy, and we continued walking. But then we passed some other things that seemed to be changing too. Like this one painting in the lobby—the first time we went in the building, the painting was a little boy who was smiling and placing flowers in a vase. When we left the building, the boy was frowning, and at his feet was the shattered vase of flowers."

"Uh-huh, that does seem kind of strange," Fuyuki commented.

"And another time, we heard piano music in one of the rooms. We wandered around a bit, trying to find where it was coming from, but ended up walking in circles through three or four rooms. There wasn't any room in the middle, either."

"Maybe… it was a recording?" Fuyuki furrowed his brow and thought. "Or maybe, someone else knew that you were coming into the building, and they wanted to scare you."

"Maybe," said Yuusho. "That almost makes sense." The next thing he said was enough to frighten even Fuyuki. "Because when we went into the apartment, there were six people in our group. When we left, there were only five."

Fuyuki fell silent.

"Someone went missing, Fuyuki. And he still is."

"Is it…. Is it haunted, do you think?"

"That's the thing. I think this place might actually be haunted, Fuyuki. Or there's some kidnapper in it of some sort. But you're good at playing detective, right? You think you might be able to find out?"

"I don't know…" he said skeptically. Then an idea hit him. "What if I came over there?"

"Here? Uh… how? Don't you have school and stuff?"

"No, it's summer right now. And don't worry about how I'll come over. I think I might be able to manage it."

He could hear Yuusho fill up with joy on the other end. "Sweet! Man, this will be so cool! Well, except for the missing person. We'll find him soon. He usually disappears a lot anyway."

Fuyuki breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe this wasn't as bad as it sounded, then….

"All right, Yuusho-san. I'll call you back when I talk to my mom about this."

"Cool! Bye!"

"Bye." Fuyuki hung up and smiled. Now it was only a matter of his mom's permission and transportation.

He called his mom up on the phone. "Hi, mom! It's Fuyuki."

"Hi, sweetie! Is there something you need?" asked his mom.

"Yeah, actually. See, there's this issue with some haunted apartment over where one of my friends is living, and so I was wondering if I could go to Mumbai for the next few days."

"Are you sure about that? It can be very dangerous traveling alone!"

"That's why I was going to ask the Sarge to help me. He's an invader, so I thought that he might want to check something like this out, as well."

"Well, if Kero-chan is going with you, I suppose it's all right…."

"Really?" Fuyuki's eyes lit up with joy. "That's great!"

"But you have to be back before the twentieth," she specified, "all right?"

"Sure thing, Mom!" He listened to some other things she had to say. "Uh-huh. Uh-huh. All right, Mom. Got it. Thanks!"

He hung up. That was easy. Now he had his mom's permission, but he decided he'd better tell his sister as well. After briefly explaining the situation to her, she didn't seem to mind that he'd be out of the house for three days. All he had to do was talk to Keroro.

Fuyuki went down the ladder to the basement floor where the green invader's room was located. He knocked on the door. "Sarge!"

"Come in, Fuyuki-dono," he instructed from within.

Fuyuki came inside and took a seat by Keroro. He was building a Gunpla at this moment, and had many others lined up alongside it.

"Sarge, I was wondering something."

"Mm-hm."

"You see, my friend wants me to come to Mumbai for the next few days, and I was wondering if you could take me."

"I see. And you sure you still haven't found my screwdriver?"

"Ah—no. So anyway, that means you'll have to stay there with me, but I'm sure that'd be all right." Fuyuki shut his eyes and gave him a nervous smile, hoping Keroro would agree. "It has a lot to do with some paranormal activity and it's really important to me—"

"Well, no. I can't."

"And—What! Why not?"

"There's a Gundam convention tomorrow and I really want to go to _that_!" Keroro looked up at him with sincere eyes. "You understand, don't you, Fuyuki-dono? This is important to me, too."

Fuyuki touched his forefingers together uncertainly. "B-but I've already talked it over with Mom… and even sis was fine with it, too…. This is the chance of a lifetime, Sarge."

Keroro looked back at him. They stared into each other's eyes. He sighed and put down the Gunpla in his hands. Keroro might have been a few things, but not inconsiderate. Oblivious and self-centered oftentimes, yes, but he wouldn't shoo Fuyuki away like that.

"I can't go with you, Fuyuki-dono. I'm sorry."

Fuyuki's expression turned to that of disappointment.

"But"—He lit up again.—"you could always ask Sergeant Major Kululu."

Disappointment again.

"Uh, I don't know…." He looked off to the side uneasily, exhaling through his teeth.

"Aw, come on. You two have traveled before, haven't you? No harm in doing it again."

Fuyuki really didn't know what to say or how to say it.

"Besides, this might be your only chance."

He rested his shoulders and sighed.

"All right, Sarge. I'll… think about it…."

"That's my Fuyuki-dono!" Keroro gave him an encouraging pat on the back and winked.

And Fuyuki smiled back.

Keroro called up Kululu, who appeared before them by spinning up from a circular panel in the floor.

"Ku ku, why have you called me up here? I'm a bit busy right now," Kululu told him, sounding irritated. He crossed his arms, tapping his foot on the floor.

"Well, so am I," Keroro said with a determined air, "but there's something that must be done!"

Kululu cocked an eye ridge at him. This was a waste of his time. If he'd called him up for the same thing that he had _last_ time….

"Here's the thing: Fuyuki-dono wants to go to Mumbai for some reason or another, but I can't take him. It—

Kululu put his hand to his mouth and laughed. "Ku ku ku, let me guess, Gundam convention ya have to go to instead?"

"Well, yeah, but it's really important to Fuyuki that he goes."

"There's a haunted apartment building that I need to see!" he told him. "My friend was telling me about it…. Apparently someone disappeared there."

"Things people claim are haunted aren't always haunted anyway. You know that, right? Ku ku."

"Yeah…" said Fuyuki.

"And since I don't feel at all obliged to take you there, why should I?"

"I don't know, and I know you wouldn't normally do this kind of thing, but…." He sighed. Begging for something from Kululu felt like being turned into a dog. …Not like he knew exactly how that felt, but he could probably ask Giroro if he really wanted to know. "Please?"

"Hm… well…." Kululu seemed to be considering. "All right."

Fuyuki's eyes lit up. He couldn't believe this. "Really?"

"Ku-ku! No, I was just joking. I've got better things to do." He turned his body, about to leave, until he saw something.

It was Fuyuki. He was looking at him with such a sad expression. Kululu usually didn't care about these things, nor did he even know why he noticed it this time. And perhaps maybe he was stretching the truth a bit, and he didn't have anything better to do after all. He itched the back of his neck and looked toward the wall beside them.

"Well," he said, "I suppose I might be able to put a few of those projects off for a couple of days…."

Fuyuki looked happy again. "A-are you being serious this time?"

Kululu said nothing, and simply gave a look to Fuyuki that said, _You owe me, big-time_.

Fuyuki was so overjoyed that he didn't notice the look. Laughing, he shook Kululu's hand in happiness. "Thank you so much, Sergeant Major! I'll make sure it'll be the quickest three days of your life."

"Eh, yeah, I sure hope that too…."

Keroro waved to them as they left his room, and he waved at them when they took off into the sky in the miniature space ship that Kululu was conveniently able to locate. He watched as the small device grazed over Giroro's tent in the backyard, which happened to explode due to its encounter with the fuel that was exerted from the ship, and blasted off higher and higher until he could no longer see it.

"Those two will have lots of fun," said Keroro, his hand positioned over his eyes to block out the sun. He just knew it. "And so will I."

In the next hour Keroro entertained himself with building yet another Gunpla to show off at the convention, while Kululu and Fuyuki meanwhile were struggling with a problematic engine. He had just finished his creating during the time that they both plummeted into the sea.

"Ah! Yes, I have a feeling that these next few days will be some good ones," said Keroro to himself.

Needless to say, Fuyuki and Kululu didn't return after those three days. They didn't return at all.


	3. Blankets and Beetles

**Thank you! (Reviewers. No I don't have telepathy but I wish I did :) I'm glad you guys are enjoying this. I'm having lots of fun writing it myself.**

* * *

—_Back to present time_—

"So, nice fire, huh?"

"Yeah."

Fuyuki and Kululu just kind of sat there on the sand, looking up at the flames on the mountaintop, yet not really knowing what to say to each other.

"You seem to be handling this situation pretty well," said Fuyuki.

"Eh." Kululu adjusted his position on the ground, so that his hands were behind him and his legs were stretched out on the sand. "There's really nothing to be worried about. Momoka and all of her Nishizawa Corps should be here anytime."

Fuyuki laughed. "Remind me why again?"

"Why what? Why it's going to be Momoka and her gang of troops who will be the ones to come for us?"

"Yeah."

Kululu brought his knee up and rested his hand upon it. "You'll learn when you're older, kid."

"Oh…." He nodded, not really getting it, but dismissing it nonetheless. "So, you're not mad at me?"

"What for?"

"You know, since I'm kind of the one at fault for bringing both of us here in the first place…. Because of Mumbai."

"Oh, you're right. This is your fault, ku-ku!"

Fuyuki winced, feeling as though he'd just done something stupid.

"Well, I'll just have to get back at you later, when I'm able to become one with my comfort zone," he told him. Fuyuki gulped. He was suddenly wishing that it would be years till they were saved.

There was another silence between them.

"So… what do you think we should do until they come?" asked Fuyuki.

"Dunno."

"It's already getting pretty dark…."

"Maybe they'll come tomorrow. Then again, the time zone here is different from the time zone over there, so it probably doesn't seem like we've been gone so long."

"An hour is an hour, no matter where you are," said Fuyuki, hugging his knees to his chest as he watched the mountain-fire.

"Eh, you've got a point there." Kululu turned his head. "Also, they might not even worry about us for the next few days, since they think we're both in Mumbai by now." He paused. "Fuyuki, do you have your cell phone with you?"

His hand dove into his pocket. There was nothing there.

Kululu picked up on the disappointed look on his face. "Hm. Just our luck. We're stuck here until they come." He lay down, letting the back of his head smack against the sand. "Urgh, there's nothing to _do_. There's not even any curry."

"Yeah, I don't think there is usually curry on deserted islands like these."

Kululu looked horrified. "That must really suck."

"Though I'm not as big a fan of curry as you, so it's not all that bad for me."

"Well, good for you then."

Fuyuki pursed his lips, breathing in through his nose. It actually wasn't that bad of an island. In fact, it was pretty cool, considering the small parts of it he'd seen. It was tropical—That was an upside. There were many animals and much other wildlife. His stomach churned. If they stayed there for too long, would they have to start hunting? He felt queasy at the thought of having to kill an animal. Especially frogs. What if they had to eat frogs? Would that be cannibalism for Kululu? Or would it not really count, since he was technically  
an alien?

"So, I guess we should go to sleep now or something," Kululu spoke.

"Yeah."

"Except we have no shelter."

"Uh-huh."

"And we probably won't be able to sleep anyway."

"Yup."

"Sooo, you wanna just stay awake then?"

"Sure," said Fuyuki.

It was bound to fail, and it did.

No sooner had they reached the end of the first hour of assuring themselves that they wouldn't sleep did they start to feel the drowsiness of slumber upon them.

"I think we should probably try to sleep now," said Kululu.

Fuyuki rubbed at his eyes. "Yeah."

Kululu stood up and walked toward the trees. He paused, then walked back. Then he walked toward the trees again.

"What are you doing?" asked Fuyuki.

"Trying to figure out how we're going to do this," he said in puzzlement.

Eventually he settled with gathering a bunch of leaves to sleep on while he had Fuyuki set up logs and stone for a fire, which they had stolen a bit off of from the mountain. There was no sun anymore, so using Kululu's glasses would no longer work. This didn't take as long as building a shelter would, and by the time the two of them were done, they were far too sleepy to even keep their eyes open for more than a minute.

"Time to sleep now, I guess," said Kululu. He smacked down onto his leaf on the ground. "See you in the morning."

"See ya." Fuyuki yawned and stretched out on his own leaf.

It was blissful when he was finally able to sleep, if only for about an hour.

Because an hour after he had put his head down, he felt something tingle on his finger.

Fuyuki's eyes fluttered open and he registered a blurry black object crawling on his hand. His eyes shot fully open, and he quickly sat up. The object was now in full focus. But all it was was just a two-inch long beetle.

Fuyuki shrieked.

"Oh, what is it _now_?!" snapped Kululu, turning his head in the boy's direction from where he was sitting on the beach.

"It's a—it's a—b-b-b-b—"

"A what? A bathtub?"

"B-b-b-bee—"

"A bee? Hm, they shouldn't be out during the night…."

"_It's a beetle!_" Fuyuki clamped his hands over his head, his whole body shaking. He just couldn't take it. Not any longer, not at all.

Kululu walked over to him and kicked the beetle into the water.

"There. Gone now."

"I will have my reveeeeenge!" the beetle screamed as it vanished in the waves.

Fuyuki slowly took his hands off his head. "Is it really gone?"

He nodded. Fuyuki felt relieved. Seeing Kululu's hand outstretched, he felt it was nice of him to help him up, but as he was ready to go to his feet, Kululu promptly walked away.

"If my calculations are right, we've been here for approximately twelve hours. It'll be about eight more hours till morning."

Fuyuki hung his head. That meant at least eight more hours with Kululu… and he probably wasn't going back to sleep, either, for fear that more beetles would crawl on him.

"Wait…. Sergeant-Major, why weren't you asleep?"

"Hng?" He turned his head at him.

"I saw you on the beach when I… uh… woke up. How come?"

Kululu furrowed his brow. "I just couldn't sleep, that's all."

"Really? You seemed kind of sleepy to me…."

"Well, I'm not."

"And you _still_ seem kind of sleepy right now."

"You're the one who's sleepy. Now go back to bed."

"I'm not a child, Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki insisted.

"Oh, really? Ku ku ku. I couldn't tell," he joked.

They looked at each other for a moment, almost as if they would be glaring in anger, but it was true: Fuyuki was rather sleepy. And so was Kululu. Not like he would ever admit that, nor was Fuyuki really intending to glare in the first place. He didn't get angry so often.

After a moment, Kululu stopped looking at him. "Look, there aren't gonna be any more beetles, all right? And even if there are, you're going to be asleep so it won't matter."

"A—"

"So just go sleep now or something and don't bother me." _This is so stupid,_ thought Kululu. _Right now he really does seem like quite a child. They're just bugs! Nothing to lose sleep over._

"Well, why aren't you sleeping, Sergeant Major?" asked Fuyuki.

"None of your business."

At this point Fuyuki was honestly too tired to argue anymore. If Kululu didn't want to sleep, then that was his own loss. Glancing back at him one last time, he crawled up onto the bed of leaves, blocked out the images of beetles in his mind, and counted Yeti for the rest of the night until he was able to descend into the land of unconsciousness.

* * *

To Fuyuki's not-so-surprise, when he awoke in the morning, Kululu was more inanimate than the petrified version of a cross-breed of a snail and a sloth.

Shrugging it off, he left to go take a quick hike up the mountain of the island and see how the signal fire was doing. When he arrived at the peak, it had gone out. Fuyuki gathered up as much wood as he could find—which meant stripping branches off trees, or gathering twigs from the ground—and adding it to the pile of ashy resemblance of what were once logs. Then he took out the other pair of Kululu's glasses from his pants pocket, and using the sun as a lighter, he waited for the small trail of upcoming smoke to evolve into a flame.

_Where does he even get so many pairs of glasses?_ he wondered. At that point he had managed to get a small fire going, and, satisfied with the accomplishment, he headed down the mountain. Kululu was probably asleep still, but Fuyuki wanted to check just to make sure.

He wasn't. By now he was wide awake, lying on his side on the sand and watching the waves roll by.

"Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki was smiling. "You're up!"

"So I am," he said.

Fuyuki walked over to him and placed himself next to Kululu, sitting with his elbows pointed outward. "So, today, I think we should make shelters. We never know when someone might come to find us, and in the meantime we should be prepared as we can be to stay here for a while."

"Okay, have fun," said Kululu.

"Well—you're going to help too, aren't you?"

"Eh. No." He scratched his butt. "I don't feel like it."

Fuyuki's eyebrows slanted upward. "Why not? We have to work together in this!"

"I never agreed to come here in the first place, so why should I do anything?"

"I never agreed to come here, either."

"Yeah, but you're the one who dragged me along on your Mumbai-expedition or whatever."

"But, Sergeant Major…." Fuyuki sighed. "It's all right. I can do this all by myself, then."

"Good for you. I'm sure you'll make lots of progress."

He clenched his fist in determination. "I will."

Oh, did Kululu love those sounds of failure as Fuyuki attempted over and over again to keep the shelter up. He really wished he had a bag of popcorn at moments like these. Yet another downside to being on a deserted island.

_I should remember to inform the Captain to place bags of popcorn on every deserted island if we ever do invade,_ he reminded himself.

After yet another episode of Fuyuki's attempt at holding up the shelter he had thrown together, he came to Kululu, twigs and other plants stuck in his hair, and his clothes becoming dirty already.

"Look at you. Ku ku. You're a mess."

"Can you help with the shelter, Sergeant Major?"

"Hm, no."

Fuyuki rested his hand and forehead against the trunk of a palm tree, exhausted. If there was no shelter, where would they sleep the next night? He certainly didn't want to be on the ground again…. Not with all those bugs…. And what if it rained? What then?

"Sergeant Major, you've _got_ to help out with this…. Please?"

"No. I don't have to at all."

"You're an inventor—can't you invent some sort of shelter? Some way to build a shelter?"

"Ku ku ku, I'm really only an inventor in the presence of technology," he informed him.

"So… you're useless without it?"

He nodded. "Pretty much."

Fuyuki thwacked his forehead against the tree trunk again. What would they do now? Maybe he needed a conch. …Except that wasn't so necessary when you only had two people. Nor would a conch magically help build a shelter.

"How about this, Sergeant Major. I'll start with the—" Fuyuki turned to where Kululu had been, but suddenly the yellow frog was gone. "Wh-what! Sergeant Major! Where are you?" Fuyuki looked around frantically, but his yellow companion was nowhere to be seen. He had completely ditched him.

Sometimes he really did wonder who was harder to keep track of: Keroro or Kululu. They both vanished so often, it was really hard to tell.

* * *

Kululu never did like nature walks. The wildlife of Keron, of course, was much smaller-sized than that of Pekopon's, but nature was nature, wherever you went.

It was especially hard to make his way around the overhanging vines, that were like large inescapable ropes that might potentially trap him at any moment. Or the fallen logs at his feet that were so large yet so easy to not see until it was too late, and he had walked right into them. Or the occasional puddles of water that were like large buckets. Or the animal leavings…. No, he didn't want to think of those again.

He didn't really care what it was that he had to get past, but he just didn't particularly like being around Fuyuki at this time. It wasn't that he hated the guy, certainly not that. In fact, Fuyuki was one of the few people he didn't mind all the time. But just like nature, people were people wherever you went. In these kinds of situations, when Kululu was forced to be alone with someone else, for more than a day, he frequently found himself not in the best of moods.

Thus, he usually walked away.

Finally decided on a proper spot with which to settle down, Kululu set himself down at the edge of a small pond (or a very large puddle, depending on one's preference of viewing it). Large, looming trees enclosed the area in a circle, with the only source of sunlight coming in from the large opening at the top, which seemed to shine down on just the pond. The grass was dry, which was a relief to Kululu, since he really hated sitting on wet grass.

By this point Fuyuki's calls to him were no longer audible, and Kululu felt himself at peace. He wondered how long it would be till they were found. He wondered for how long he would have to endure this.

* * *

**Okay: Problem. I've finished writing my rough outline, but there are still too many plotholes. If anyone has ideas for this thing (regarding Fuyuki especially), then I'd love to hear them. Anyone know anything unusual about Fuyuki's character that could be built off of?**


	4. Explorations

**Wow. I can't believe we're on chapter four already. I've almost caught up with myself! DX**

* * *

It only took about two more hours for Fuyuki to decide that he was done with this. Struggling to build a shelter, as it seemed, didn't actually get the shelter to be built. It would be no use, with an arm strength like his. He walked off, deciding instead that in the meantime, a map of the island was something else that they needed, too.

Or just he needed it, as it seemed… since Kululu wasn't much help.

Fuyuki shrugged it off. He didn't want to be mean, but it was time Kululu learned that if he didn't put his share into the work, then he wasn't getting anything out of it. Sure, it may have been Fuyuki's fault for getting them into the whole mess, but that didn't mean that Kululu could just go and blame Fuyuki and then not do anything because of that. He wasn't going to carry Kululu's weight on his shoulders, that was for sure. Fuyuki's hope was that eventually, Kululu would come to realize the importance of teamwork in this.

Making a map wouldn't be as simple as he thought. Although the island wasn't _all_ that big, it would still be a long way to walk, and Fuyuki knew that before long he would get tired out. Making a map also required two things Fuyuki did not have—paper and pencil.

_I suppose I could just use a big leaf for paper,_ he thought. There'd always be the downside that it would get ruined quickly, but it was all he had right now. He could easily use a piece of tree bark for something to write with.

Going to the tree that had the largest leaves on it (Fuyuki didn't quite know what tree it was called), he reached his hand up as far as it could go to pluck one of the leaves. This was a hard task, since all the leaves were pretty high up. But eventually, Fuyuki was able to grab the tip of the leaf, which snapped off as the rest of the tree sprung upward. He tried again and this time he was able to grab the leaf by its stem, which he snapped off the rest of the branch with a noisy _crrrack_. The branch sprung upward, but not before scraping Fuyuki across the cheek as it did so.

"Ow!" Fuyuki brought his hand to his cheek. It wasn't bleeding, but he could feel the skin throbbing where the branch had grazed him.

Scanning the trees around him, he looked for the ones with the reddest bark. Coming upon one that was especially red and dusty, he snapped off a strip and practiced writing on the leaf with it. No such luck; it hardly made a print at all. He could press down any harder and the leaf would probably rip right in half. It would be better to use a slate instead, which wouldn't snap.

Fuyuki didn't know where to find a slate. Even if he did, he probably wouldn't be able to break it off a rock, not with his strength. He went to the tree next to that one, which had a much whiter bark, and he stripped off a section of it in one solid piece. It was curved, but it would still work. He quickly shook off all the ants and grub from it, shuddering slightly, and pressed down on the U-shaped surface with the strip of red bark. It made a powdery, red line. Good enough.

Fuyuki left the trees and scanned his eyes along the beach, taking note on his curve of bark of whatever landmarks stood out. Once finishing sketching everything there was to see there, he made his way along the shore, eyeing the ins and outs of the beach, noticing where the trees stopped and rocks began, and memorizing the different kinds of animals he saw. Venturing around the island, there were various areas that he committed to memory.

One section of the shoreline curved in dramatically in one place, creating a crescent shape where the waves crashed in slowly. It was a peaceful area, Fuyuki thought, especially since that was home to the biggest number of coconut trees on that island.

On the opposite side of the beach where they had slept the night was a steep trail that led to a cliff. Below the cliff, there were only rocks. The only way to get past the rocks was to either walk up the cliff (which was grassy, luckily), or to swim past them in the water. And since Fuyuki couldn't swim, he knew that he wouldn't be doing the latter option.

A few dozen yards away from a cliff was a suspicious pit of mud and sand that gave Fuyuki a queasy feeling….

Walking further onward from that he found a very large tree, which seemed to be many feet in diameter, and looked to be deciduous and sturdy, also offering quite a bit of shade. Scattered at the roots of the behemoth were various mushrooms, which might, if it happened to be that they weren't poisonous, offer the possibility of being potential food.

These were all the landmarks that he had seen so far, with the addition of the mountain, which was located in the center of the island. He reminded himself that soon, maybe tomorrow, he'd have to hike up the mountain again to get a view of what else was on the island that he'd missed, especially in the forested parts, since he'd only been sketching things he'd seen on the shore.

As Fuyuki continued along the beach, he caught something unusual-looking with his eye, something that didn't look as if it meant to be on a beach. He quickly ran to it to see what it was, after having to dig the rest of it out from the sand. Large, metal, and covered in a strange black dust… or was that just sand? Yes, this was one of the parts to the ship! He had to tell Kululu right away.

Fuyuki looked up at the sky. It wasn't any darker than it had been when he'd started his journey around the island, but the sun was beating hotter upon him, meaning it was probably around noon. He was sweating like crazy. Fuyuki placed his map momentarily on the ground so he could scramble out of his sweatshirt and tie it around his waist, knowing he'd still need it later, probably during the night. He took off his regular shirt too. It was still too hot, but that was the best he could do. He picked up the map again and began walking back to the beach, feeling that he'd already seen the rest of the edge of the island.

The part of the beach where they had slept the night wasn't so far away, which was a good thing. After some more walking, Fuyuki came upon it, dropping everything he had onto the ground. He was so much lighter after that.

Where was Kululu? He looked around, and a horrible realization hit him. If he had just been overheating a few minutes ago, what had become of a Keronian of Kululu? Last he checked, Keronians needed constant water and humidity to stay alive, so….

Fuyuki started running. It didn't take him long before a voice stopped him in his tracks.

"Where are you running off to now, huh? Ku ku ku."

Fuyuki turned his head every whichway till he spotted Kululu, sitting laxly in the shade of a large palm tree.

"Sergeant Major! Are you all right?" Fuyuki ran to him, still panting quite a bit from his sort-of-run two seconds ago.

"Yeah, yeah, why wouldn't I be?" Kululu bent his head back and took a sip from a half-coconut which he had had by him.

"Don't Keronians need water constantly?"

"There's water here."

"Where?"

"On the island."

"Where on the island?" asked Fuyuki.

"In a place where I can easily access it should I feel like I'm drying out."

Fuyuki breathed out. So Kululu wasn't dead then, not yet. He remembered something.

"The shelter—"

"Is done."

Fuyuki gave him a surprised look.

"What? I had nothing better to do, okay? Ku ku ku…."

He craned his neck toward where he had been building the shelter, and Kululu was telling the truth. Fuyuki went closer to it and inspected the structure. Sturdy, durable… it didn't even look sloppy. He didn't believe this. How'd he do it so fast, too?

"Why'd you do it? And how?" he asked. "I thought you said you couldn't do anything without technology."

"Eh." Kululu just shrugged. "I've got some experience in building things. And simple shelters from sticks and leaves isn't actually all that hard to make, even for someone with minimal upper body strength like me."

…Kululu must've been deliberately irking him at this point….

"Besides," he continued. His fingers fidgeted with the now-empty coconut husk. "I suppose I really do kind of owe you one…."

"Huh? Why?"

"You know… that thing…."

"…What thing?"

"The thing when we first got on this island? And I was unconscious?"

Fuyuki thought a moment about what he was saying. Yeah, he remembered. "It's okay, Sergeant Major. If I didn't do it, you would've probably died or something."

"Yeah, so, you sort of saved my life." Reluctantly, as if it took all that he had to utter the word, he added, "Thanks…."

Fuyuki didn't know what to say. But Kululu felt grateful to him. That meant a lot.

"I mean, I know it was probably your first time actually having to do CPR…."

"What?" Fuyuki's senses snapped back in at this. "I don't know CPR, Sergeant Major. That's why I was freaking out. I kind of just gave you a few slaps on the back, and you just coughed up the water."

Kululu gave him a strange look, as if he couldn't believe what he heard.

"Then—"

"I never learned CPR," he said.

"Momoka… never taught you?"

"Why would Nishizawa-san teach me?"

Kululu's voice neared silence and leaned back against the tree. "I just… thought…." He cleared his throat.

"Maybe, did you… want… me to give you CPR?"

His brow furrowed. "Um. No. I'm very happy with this arrangement."

Fuyuki forced a quiet laugh, hoping to break the silence that now commenced. He put his hands on his hips, then slid them back down, exhaling.

"Uh… so, I made a map—"

"That's nice," said Kululu. "One less thing that we have to do."

He clenched his fists. If talking with Kululu wasn't the hardest thing ever, he didn't know what was. Fuyuki wished dreadfully that Keroro would be here in the yellow frog's place instead. Not to say that he didn't mind Kululu's company, but it was cruel for fate to have set the two up in this. There would be no progress. In anything. He could count on that much.

Fuyuki took a seat down on the sand. "By the way, Sergeant Major… there's something I've been meaning to ask you."

"Yeh?" He began to take another sip from a coconut husk.

"Can you, uh…." Fuyuki puzzled in thought. "How do I say this…. Can you swim?"

_Sppppth._

Kululu spewed out his mouthful of coconut-milk across the sand.

"So… is that a no?" Fuyuki wondered. "'Cause… when you almost drowned in the water, it—"

"No! Course I can swim." Kululu wiped off his mouth with the back of his hand. "All Keronians can swim."

"But… you seemed pretty surprised when I asked you…."

"I just didn't expect you to ask such an _obvious_ question, ku ku!"

They looked at each other for a moment. Kululu's eyes went off to the side. Fuyuki's fingers played on his upper arms. No words passed between them.

"You can't, can you."

"And if I can't?"

"Doesn't matter to me. I can't either."

"You're not a frog-like species…."

"Well…. Yeah, but…." Fuyuki had nothing to that.

Kululu narrowed his eyes at him. Fuyuki knew what this meant. "To a Pekoponian like you, this… issue may seem to not matter as much. But when we get off this island, tell anyone and I will make certain that you wish you'd never left it."

After that threatening sentence, Kululu gave his signature laugh, which sent shivers up Fuyuki's spine.

And yet, it was interesting, knowing one thing that Kululu had a weakness in. Fuyuki didn't mind. That just meant he was normal, that was all. There wasn't anything he would do to take advantage with this knowledge, and Kululu was well aware of this.

"Are you…. Are you the only Keronian who can't swim?"

He caught a sigh from him. "That I know of, yes."

"Oh…. Uh, sorry about that."

"Eh. Nothing I can do about it." For some reason, after threatening him, he didn't seem to be as angry about it. Maybe it was because he'd finally admitted to someone. He scooted away from the tree trunk and lay down on the sand. "Some people were just made to not be able to swim, I guess." Kululu shrugged. "Besides, there are tons of other things I can do. Abilities like mine are hard to come by most of the time."

"Ha ha…." Fuyuki forced a smile.

Kululu turned onto his side.

"The only problem now, I suppose, is that neither of us can swim and yet here we are right now."

"What do you mean?"

He sat up. "We're stranded on a deserted island, Fuyuki," he reminded him. As a large wave crashed onto shore, soaking the sands a darker shade, he said to him, "Neither of us can swim. We don't know how long we're going to be stuck here, so if we want to survive this place, then we'd better learn how."


	5. Fish Fish Fish Fish Yay

Suddenly now the moment didn't seem to special and touching, when reality struck Fuyuki in the face.

It was true, and Kululu could do nothing to deny it, that they didn't know for certain whether or not Momoka and the rest would come for them. Even so, they'd have to tide it out till then. Neither of them were survivalists in the least bit. Heck, they couldn't even swim to save their lives, nor would they probably even be able to learn how to do so, since neither could teach the other. It was a miracle they'd been able to come this far, and it was only the second day. Fuyuki remembered this as his stomach began to growl.

"Oh… um… we should really get some food soon," he said. He couldn't believe that he'd forgotten to eat all day.

Kululu nodded. "Yeah."

The two of them gathered food for a while, until they had a presentable pile of… fruit. Only fruit. Fruit wouldn't be enough to tide them over for long enough. As if by an unspoken agreement, Kululu and Fuyuki passed a glance at each other, both knowing that soon they would need meat if they didn't want to go crazy in the next day or so.

"You wouldn't happen to be able to hunt, would you?" Kululu asked.

Fuyuki shook his head. "Uh, no."

"Okay, neither can I. How bout fishing? Can you fish?"

"No."

"…Can you do _anything_?"

Again, Fuyuki shook his head.

Kululu sigh and dragged his knuckles down the side of his face. This was hopeless. Absolutely _hopeless_.

"Well, we're going to have to learn how to get some meat, and soon."

Fuyuki lowered his head shamefully.

"And don't you give up now, because I have an idea." Kululu put his piece of fruit down and stood up, pacing around. "Now I don't know about you, but I'm not much of a fan of spear-fishing. …That is what it's called, isn't it?"

"I'm not so sure myself," said Fuyuki.

"Oh, well, whatever it is, we both know what I'm talking about all the same. I think other methods would work better, ku ku ku."

"What kind of methods?"

Kululu reached out his hand and pointed at the waves coming in. "If you've been paying attention to the pattern of the waves, it's low-tide in the morning, and high-tide in the evening. Right now it's afternoon, so eventually the tide will come back in and envelop half the beach. If we make good use of that time, we might be able to dig a hole."

"Why would we need to dig a hole?"

"If we dig a hole—say—around here, or somewhere nearby"—Kululu traced a rough circle on the sand with his foot—"when the tide comes in, it will fill up with water, yes? Ku ku, right. If we're lucky, it might even bring in some fish. The tide goes out, the fish might go out too. But the next morning, when it's back to low-tide, the hole will be full of 'em."

Fuyuki put his hand to his chin. "That might work, but… wouldn't the sand just be brushed in the hole it with the first tide? Or what if the hole collapses? I mean, it's sand…."

"Sand, yes, but when you get deep enough, it's more compact and gooey. If we have enough tree bark around the edges to stabilize it, then it will have a smaller chance of collapsing in on itself. Also spreading the bark around the sand around it will help, too."

Fuyuki was still skeptical about this plan. "How would we dig the hole in the first place?"

Kululu held up two clam shells and looked up at him.

Fuyuki let out a sigh. Those would be hard to dig with… but his stomach growled at the thought of meat. Besides, this was Kululu's idea, and he had a feeling that this was a rare moment. So he agreed to help.

Digging with clam shells was _much_ harder than they'd imagined. In less than a quarter hour, their arms ached like they never had before, and they hadn't made that much progress.

"It's strange," said Kululu. "Usually, whenever I thought of being on a deserted island, I never expected for there to be _work_ to go along with it."

"There usually is," breathed Fuyuki, putting down his clam shell. He wiped a string of sweat from off his forehead. He didn't know for how much longer he could go on with this.

But somehow, through the art of speed-digging, they were able to dig a hole big enough, and stabilize it with the help of lots and lots of tree bark, before the high tide came. They both waited in anticipation to see if it would hold. The first wave made it wobble a bit, and some sand went in through the edges. They both drew in their breath. The wave went out, and one of the strips of bark curved a little. The next wave rolled in and the piece of bark was pushed back again, but luckily, the hole didn't change shape again.

Fuyuki let out his breath. "Now what?"

"Now we wait," said Kululu.

"Till when?"

"Till morning."

"It's a long ways till then…."

"Well then, you'll just have to occupy yourself with something else for the time being."

"Like what?"

Kululu shrugged. "I dunno. What else is there on the island that you need to do?"

"Um…. Oh!" Fuyuki suddenly remembered. Sprinting over to the spot where he'd tossed his shirt and map, he dug through the sand till he found what he was looking for. He came back and handed it to Kululu.

"Ku? What's this?" Kululu turned it around in his hands. "It seems to be one of the parts of the ship…."

"I found it by the beach," said Fuyuki.

"Which one? The one around the island?"

"What other one is there…?"

"Dunno, ku ku ku!"

Fuyuki peered over his shoulder. "What part is that, by the way?"

"Oh, this? This is the fuel pressurizer."

"And… what does that do?"

"It's one of the simplest parts in a Keronian ship. See this little opening? When the ship speeds up, it tightens, so that the fuel is blasted out at a higher pressure. The ship slows down, and it loosens, and enlarges."

"That's cool," said Fuyuki. "Alien technology is so interesting! I always thought it would be a bit more sci-fi, though…. You get what I mean?"

"Ku ku, I think so. For the most part, our technology isn't all complicated to understand, if you know a lot about it… even though it _is_ way more advanced compared to Pekopon's pitiful excuses for technology, ku-ku!"

"Hey…!" said Fuyuki. "I'm sure you don't mean that…. Since you know a lot about technology, it probably seems _a lot_ more easier to you."

"Well…. Yeah. Ku ku!"

Fuyuki's shoulders slumped. "Thought so." There still might have been hope for fulfilling his dream of being able to pilot an alien ship at least once in his lifetime. There was still hope….

If they managed to get OFF this island in the first place, that was. Which Fuyuki hoped would be soon.

As the two of them retired to their own individual tasks to make their living on the island more tolerable, Fuyuki felt his patience growing thinner and thinner. Which still wasn't so thin, considering his bountiful amount of patience beginning their arrival. But Kululu didn't seem to be doing anything. There was that one shocker regarding the shelter, and then his idea for the fishing-hole, so Fuyuki remained assuring himself that perhaps this was just the way Kululu worked, and that at any given moment he might surprise him with another great deal of work done that Fuyuki couldn't have accomplished on his own.

As the minutes passed, Fuyuki grew less and less certain that this would happen again. Kululu was either doing one of two things: Sitting around on his lazy butt, refusing to lift a finger while Fuyuki gathered more food, or set up a fire, or fixed up the shelter, or the like; or paced around aimlessly, looking at the things that Fuyuki did with a critical eye and nagging him about everything he was doing.

Fuyuki was beginning to get annoyed. And that was saying something. There was hardly any time where he was actually _annoyed_ at something. Then again, this was Kululu, the person that could potentially irritate anyone out of their wit except if they were somehow able to beat him to the chase… which was normally very unlikely.

"Hm, I think you should tighten the vine a bit more up there," Kululu suggested, pointing to the vine that held a suspended contraption, a ball of leaves that had a singular opening with their remaining fruit resting in it. "It looks like it'll just tumble right down, ku-ku!"

Fuyuki took a breath and clenched his fists at his side. No, he would not get angry. He was more self-controlled than that. Considering this was Kululu, there would probably be a lot of worse events in the future, so if he wasted his anger right now, then that would leave them in no good favor.

"Sergeant Major," said Fuyuki, hoping he still sounded calm, "would you like to assist me? I could really use some help…."

"Ku ku ku…. Nah, looks like you got it." Kululu gave him a thumbs-up and walked away. Fuyuki frowned. What was even the point of that, then, if Kululu was just going to say he didn't have to fix it in the end, after all? People were so confusing sometimes….

Luck was on his side. Fuyuki didn't have to speak to Kululu again until night came, which usually comes after evening, except on planets that rotate backward. The fire was just about dying out. A magnificent sunset was slowly dissolving into the distance, as a dark blanket of blue stretched out above them. Fuyuki could just barely make out parts of the island. He wished he had some lamp of some sort, just any source of light.

Unless…. Wait, what could that be? Fuyuki put his hand over his eyes and squinted. Just a little ways away, he could see two long, horizontal cones columns of light spill out from an unknown source. He stepped closer to it… closer… closer…

…until he bumped into Kululu.

"Ah!" Fuyuki stumbled and almost lost his balance, while Kululu was sent onto the ground. He lifted the frog back up and looked him in the eye, which hurt, since that was where the light was coming from, so he stopped. "Sergeant Major… why are your glasses glowing like that?"

"Hmf." Kululu adjusted his glasses on his face, also making the two cones of light move a bit. "My glasses can be used as flashlights."

"They can be? I didn't know tha—"

"Now, can you please put me down?"

"Oh, right." Fuyuki dropped him. "Ah! I'm sorry, Sergeant Major!"

"Oww…." Kululu grunted briefly, then helped himself up. He brushed his limbs off. "You should get to bed now. Don't mind my wonderful glasses that give off light, Fuyuki; you're not a moth."

Fuyuki opened his mouth, realized that Kululu was right, then closed it.

"Reluctant to sleep, are you? Ku ku ku. I can't guarantee that the shelter will keep out the beetles, but at least it's better than sleeping on the sand."

"That's not actually what I—"

"Oh? Okay then. Don't see any reason for you to be staying up in that case. Now off to bed you go."

"But you're going to go to sleep too, right?"

"Course I am. I'm just going to do so _after_ you." He glared at him mildly through his blinding glasses. "We've had this talk before. Now get some sleep."

Fuyuki really wasn't in the mood for arguing, but he couldn't bring himself to understand why Kululu seemed so defensive at this particular issue. He stretched and headed off toward the shelter. But whatever it was, he supposed that he'd just have to find out in the morning, when there was actually enough energy in his body to enable him to think straight.

* * *

**I totally did not procrastinate on writing more chapters yesterday! Really!**

**But at least I'm done with writing all the boring chapters, and now I'm on to the exciting ones... (These and the next three chapters or so are the boring ones.) So yeah, that will be fun, I think.**

**Any guesses as to why Kululu doesn't want to sleep I will happily read, but only the true one will receive an internet cookie. Bua ha ha ha ha. (Asking RKBW is cheating.)**


	6. The Snail Will Tell Us

**Oh my Lord of Terror I am so catching up with myself. I've gotta pick up the pace with this.**

**Be sure to notify me if I seem to have skipped any chapters or reposted the same one, all right? Or if I accidentally posted the chapter for a story that wasn't mine. (I'm one of those beta-readers who forgets to delete other people's chapters when I upload them to the doc manager, so that's why.)**

* * *

Fuyuki didn't know when it would be that Kululu went to sleep. Nor did he care at the moment, because honestly, all he really wanted to do was sleep as well. And that was just what he did.

It was so nice to finally have some rest. The shelter was quite sturdy, also. And big. Fuyuki reminded himself to thank Kululu later when it was morning. Before he'd even realized it, he drifted off, forgetting all his troubles throughout that day.

* * *

That night, Kululu dreamed a dream that was quite a frightening one.

It involved his mother. She was chasing him down a rainy street, sweater in hands, and insisting that he put it on before he went out to play. But Kululu defied her. He just kept on running, faster and faster, hoping to evade the madwoman armed with that dreaded fluffy article of clothing.

He wasn't having much luck running away from her. No matter where he went, she always seemed to be there, right in front of him, grinning like she was scheming something. What was she planning to do with that sweater? Kululu started running again, but in slow-motion. A Nyororo slithered by on the ground and he tripped over it, covering himself with muddy water.

And then his mom caught up to him and wrapped the sweater around his wrists, which were now behind his back, and told him that he was going to prison.

When Kululu asked what it could possibly be that led up to this decision of hers, all she replied was that he was misbehaving by having skipped school so much. Kululu told her that the schools were evil because they wanted him to put on sweaters too. Then the sweater grew a mouth and ate off his hands.

It was horrifying.

Whilst this dream of his, in the real world it was early morning—around five or six o'clock, if Fuyuki was somehow able to tell time—and Fuyuki was watching Kululu sleep, having nothing better to do. He knew that the guy would've gone to sleep eventually. He just didn't have to do it in the _trees_ was all.

Fuyuki himself hadn't really been able to sleep, since his dreams that night were infested with visions of beetles crawling… beetles crawling everywhere all over him…. He shuddered, thinking of this memory.

And yet, he wondered what it was that now the yellow Keronian dreamt of, as he seemed to sleep so soundly, clutching a fallen leaf around his shoulders as if it were some precious blanket. He would give an occasional kick of his leg, as if fighting something off in his dream, and some sort of whimper or groan that followed after. It was almost sweet-looking, if one was to ignore the fact that it was Kululu.

Gently, Fuyuki scooped up the frog in his arms, and carried him over to the shelter where he'd be able to sleep better. He quietly set him down against the soft leaves that covered the ground, in the area just before it met the sand, and took his hands out from underneath him. The guy looked so serene. He couldn't even call him evil, just looking at how he slept.

There was only one last thing Fuyuki did. He took his sweatshirt and folded it into a square, which he placed under the sleepy head of Kululu, and then waited till he awoke.

Fuyuki fell asleep again as well, only waking up an hour or so later. Right now, he noticed, it was low-tide. He quickly walked over to the fishing-hole to see if they'd caught their prize, and sure enough, as luck would have it, he witnessed several tiny (_tiny_) fish swimming about in their hole, struggling for escape.

"Ah!" Fuyuki marveled, peering into the opening with his hands fastened at the end. He felt his back foot give way, and he almost stumbled inside, but luckily he caught himself before that happened. "I should go tell the Sergeant-Major! No… wait." He thought. "He's sleeping. I'll wait until he wakes up, and instead get the fish ready for us to eat."

As he started the fire up, Fuyuki wondered how to do this. It couldn't be that hard, could it? All you had to do was put the fish on sticks and wait for them to cook. He frowned. _How_ to put them on sticks, though? They were really tiny, the longest ones being the length of his finger, and not only that, but how to kill them in the first place? His stomach churned at the thought of having to end the life of a fish. He'd never done something like this before.

So he had to experiment. It wasn't as fun as it sounded. Undoubtedly Fuyuki agreed to himself that after they got off this island, he would never, _ever_ touch a live fish again.

It took forever to wash the blood off his fingers, too.

Mercifully, he eventually found a way to get the fishes—while dead—onto the sticks, and stuck them in the ground by the fire. While the fishes cooked, he decided to go and awaken Kululu.

This proved to be a harder task than he thought. Kululu seemed to be in the midst of some unexplainable nightmare, so horrid that it cannot be expressed in words. Fuyuki nudged him by the shoulders, puzzling over various methods of awakening him, until Kululu leapt up in a cold sweat.

"Sw-sw-sweater!" he shouted.

"What?" Fuyuki gave him a blank stare.

Kululu glared and through the leaf off of him. He got to his feet, giving a quick glance at the sweatshirt that Fuyuki had laid down for him as a pillow, and scoffed.

"What's for breakfast?"

"Fish."

"Oh? We were finally able to catch some?"

Fuyuki smiled. "That's right!"

"Let's see these fish, then."

Fuyuki led him to the fire pit, in which the tiny, _tiny_ fish were lanced with sticks and slowly baking over the flames.

"Frog, they're tiny."

"Yeah… we didn't catch many big ones…." Fuyuki put his forefingers together. "Maybe, better luck next time?"

"Eh. You're too much of an optimist." Kululu scooted a small log toward the fire pit for him to sit on, and then took a few of the sticks with fish on them. Fuyuki sat down on the log and did the same.

As Kululu nibbled into the small fries, he scooted away from Fuyuki a bit, who gave him a strange look in response to the action. But he said nothing of it. They were both relieved to finally be eating _some_ sort of meat, however small it was.

It was a lot cooler that day than it was yesterday. There were clouds in the sky, some of which blocked out the sun overhead for miniscule periods. Both of them wished somewhat that it would start raining and cool down the rest of the island, as well. It was nice that it wasn't so cold all the time, though it was still way too hot. Fuyuki had already developed numerous sunburns on his upper arms and face, and Kululu, he wasn't so sure about. He didn't look any redder. Maybe it was because he'd bathed in curry so much that it had created a protective layer of the stuff over his skin.

As Fuyuki chowed down on the small fishes on his sticks, a small curiosity rose to the front of his mind. "Hey, Sergeant Major." Fuyuki put his hand over his mouth, swallowing the fish. They had a lot of tiny bones in them.

"Yeah? Ku ku ku."

"I've kind of noticed… that you don't seem to like going to sleep." Fuyuki hoped he'd be able to tell where this was going.

"My preferences are none of your business."

Even so, he continued to pry. "Is it because you have nightmares?"

"What?" Kululu just blinked at him.

"I mean, it's not like it's a bad thing to be afraid of having nightmares…. I have them sometimes too. Everybody does."

Kululu paused a moment, registering Fuyuki's nonsense. "You… think… I'm afraid of having nightmares?"

"Well, are you?"

Kululu turned away. "I thought I told you to mind your own business."

"I—"

He tossed the fish-less sticks onto the sand and brushed off his hands. "I'm done here. I'll be talking a walk, and in the meantime, you can fix up camp or whatever."

"Wait—!" Fuyuki called out to him, but he was already walking away. He sighed and lowered his hand. Things with Kululu were so impossible, even something simple like a conversation.

* * *

It didn't take long for him to be able to find his way back to the hidden spot on the island, since his path entering the place last time was still evident to be seen. Where he'd tripped… and fallen… and snapped twigs and branches… and trudged through the undergrowth.

He wasn't at all a fan of nature, but even Kululu had to admit that it was places like these that made him feel at peace. That was, more at peace than being around people.

There was one particular place on the circle of grass surrounding the small pond that Kululu found to make a nice sitting-spot, after he gathered enough moss and leaves to make it so. Fuyuki didn't have to know about this place. This was for him. Fuyuki would never find out.

The water was so clear. He considered settling into it, to bathe, but feared that that might taint the liquid. Not that he cared so much for nature, but it was sort of a subconscious thing. Kululu shut his eyes, listening to the sounds around him. They were bothersome.

When he opened his eyes, they went directly to a large fallen branch next to him, suspended above the ground by two rocks on one end and a split trunk on the other. On the branch crawled a sheepish snail, seeming as if it had no place to go in such a hurry, and that it had all the time in the world. The snail's shell was a swirl, just like his insignia.

"Oh, snail." Kululu rested his elbows on the fallen branch, gazing at the mollusk. He flicked his finger back and forth lazily. "Such a tiny, insignificant Pekoponian creature…. No one will ever notice you. You'll never make a mark on the planet. What does it even matter if you get to the place you're going? All you're doing is finding a way to survive, which is pretty much just waiting until you die. Maybe that will help feed some other animal, but the same thing will happen to _it_."

Kululu turned his head onto its side, now looking into the trees, as he placed his hand in front of the snail to prevent it from going any further. "There are so many confusing things about people. Why does Fuyuki feel the need to pry so much into my own matters? It really doesn't concern him. I can't understand why he doesn't just _leave_ already, and go to the other side of the island or something. He should've by now. Anyone else would've, knowing me as I am."

The snail crawled onto his hand. Kululu lifted it up, watching as it left a small trail of slime across his fingers. "People annoy me. They always will. Even though he and I are both not survivalists, I feel certain that I might be able to work better just by myself." His shoulders slumped. "But I know better than that. There's really no way I can…."

He sighed and placed the snail back on the branch, making it face the opposite direction. He didn't really care. "Fuyuki should just do things by himself. He knows that much. He knows I won't be any help to him, because there's nothing I can do here. Nothing at all. Fuyuki can get by better if he's by himself. He's more capable. Taller, stronger. Other people know this too. Back home, if they knew the situation we were in, they'd be rooting for Fuyuki… cheering him on, supporting him till they could come and save him from the island." He brought his fist down on the branch, placing his other hand over his eyes shamefully. "What did I even…? '_Back home_?' Is that really what I just said? Ugh…."

After a few moments he took his hand off of his eyes, placing it back on the branch as he traced circles on its knots. "Being a snail must be so easy. You never have to worry about what other people will say, or do, or think. You get by on your own and never have to depend on others to help you." He absentmindedly pat his finger on the snail's eyespots, who recoiled its tentacles as he did so. He waited as it poked them cautiously back out. "Yeah, it must be so easy…."

Kululu straightened up suddenly in his seat. "Hey, you're not listening to me, are you?"

The snail didn't respond.

"You shouldn't do that. You should be listening to me. Why aren't you listening to me?"

He placed his thumb and forefinger over the swirled shell of the snail, applying a gentle amount of pressure onto it.

"You know better than that. You don't care about what I say at all, do you?"

He pressed harder.

"That's right, you don't. You don't care what _anyone_ says; all you care about is yourself, because you're just a snail!"

As he pressed the snail's shell even harder, it gave a crack and burst into many pieces, the body of the snail oozing lifelessly out. Kululu tossed it into the trees angrily. He never liked snails, anyway.

All of a sudden, something cold and breezy shifted over the back of Kululu's neck. He swiveled around, but nothing seemed to be there.

_It couldn't have been Fuyuki, could it have?_ he wondered, with a bitter amount of disappointment. Fuyuki pulling a prank on him? It didn't seem likely.

Kululu made his way into the trees, which cast more shadows today due to the minimal sunlight. The forest seemed dark and ominous, with an unwelcoming air. He pressed further, determined to find what it was that passed over him.

As he peered in through the trees, he felt a hand rest on his shoulder. He turned around but just as last time, there was nothing there.

He continued wandering around, looking for something, _anything_. There was nothing. After a while he stopped caring, and decided it was just a leaf that had fallen. That was the possibility that made the most sense. Sitting down on a log with his jaw resting in his hands, he decided he'd stay here instead, since he had already walked a long ways away from the clearing and he was too lazy to walk back.

Just as his eyes began to droop as the sunlight beat down overhead, chasing away the clouds, he thought he saw something white.

Kululu sprang to his feet. He blinked again, and there was nothing there. A second later, a white figure slowly faded into view, drifted forward a bit, then faded out again.

It sent a bit of a shiver up his spine, watching this, but he knew he must immediately tell Fuyuki, who'd be thrilled to hear of this on the island. He ran through the trees, stumbling over twigs and branches he would usually hop over, until he reached the edge of the forest, where the beach began.

Fuyuki was there on the sand, adjusting the roof of the shelter. Kululu paused, thought it over, and decided that Fuyuki needn't know. He turned around and headed back to the clearing.


	7. There's Something About This Place

**AW YISS. Yesterday I pulled it off. I officially wrote 30k words in five days. Woot! Okay, well, six days, but close enough.**

**I did the same thing last summer, too. First it was The Tale of Marie. Then it was HYASHL. I was so worn out after that, I pretty much just watched Yu-Gi-Oh abridged the rest of the summer. But not this time. After I'm done writing OFDW, I'm going… to… write… more stuff?**

**Let's see if I can get this up to 50k words.**

* * *

Fuyuki tossed the last log onto the fire pit and began Kululu's pair of fire-starting glasses to ignite the initial flame. As usual, their signal fire had gone out by morning, and he had to do it over again. He would need to find a better way to keep it going into the night. As for Kululu, where was that guy? he questioned. Last time he'd seen him, Kululu had said that he'd be talking a walk, but after that, he didn't come back. And he still hadn't. _Maybe… he just got lost?_ thought Fuyuki. It was a possibility, and a very likely one, at that.

As he headed down the mountain, walking with his feet sideways on the extra-steep places so as not to trip… as much, Fuyuki looked around him for any sight of the yellow frog. When he arrived at the foot of the mountain and there was still no trace of Kululu, Fuyuki knew that he might have to venture a bit further into the forest to be able to find him.

He walked almost everywhere, making sure that there wasn't a place in the trees he hadn't already seen, but after about an hour or so he began to loop back around the island. He'd walked in circles, squares, spirals, parallelograms, and even hexagons, but Kululu was still yet to be found. Fuyuki knew that he'd seen all of the island by now. He just knew it. Or thought he knew it, at least…. But if there was a place Fuyuki couldn't get to, then how could Kululu get there and not him?

After a few more long minutes of searching, he couldn't do it anymore. He just could not. His limbs were tired, he was running out of breath, he was hungry like heck, and he'd already been through these places dozens of times before. _The Sergeant Major will know what to do,_ he thought. _He can take care of himself. He knows not to do stupid things that will get him hurt or something._ Assuring himself of this, Fuyuki cut through the trees, heading back to the beach with a confident—and tired—air.

Instead, now that he was no longer looking for Kululu, he thought of something else to do. While fish were tasty, they were still quite small and probably wouldn't tide the two of them over for long enough. As much as the thought nauseated Fuyuki, he knew that he needed to find a better way of obtaining food. Food that wouldn't be fruit, because you didn't have to do much to get fruit. And that entitled something he wasn't quite used to—killing animals.

Fuyuki didn't know anything about killing animals for food. He wasn't much of a hunter, _at all_, nor did he ever think that he would need to be. And the thought of ending the life of an animal… like a baby bunny… with such cute little eyes, and desperate paws…. Would his heart really be stronger than his stomach? He didn't count on it.

He wished Giroro were there on the island with him. He'd have known what to do.

He had seen rabbits passing occasionally through the bramble on his search for Kululu and the first time he'd looped the island while making a map, but he didn't put much thought into the little mammals. How to even trap them, in the first place? He thought of rabbit traps, which involved rope, of course, which they didn't have. In his mind he assembled one. It should be connected to some sort of tree or branch… and had some sort of noose on the end, didn't it? And then it would catch the rabbit by the leg, which would dangle helplessly in the air until Fuyuki would come for it, and end its life.

Fuyuki didn't like the thought of this. He wished there was some other way they could get meat, like it would fall from the sky or something. He imagined himself armed with a bow and arrow, shooting down seagulls from above. Then, in this fantasy, a thought struck him. _What would happen if the Sarge was passing by overhead, about to rescue us, and I shot him down by accident? Who would come for us then?_

It wasn't likely to happen, he knew, but so much for the seagull thing. Not like he knew how to use a bow and arrow anyway, or how to make one, or how to find the _materials_ to make one.

He supposed it would have to be the rabbits, then. As for the rabbit traps, he'd just have to experiment. _Experiment…._ The word rang through his head as he was reminded of the fish. His last experience with experimentation didn't go so well.

Vines were easy to find. They were everywhere, and were almost as good as rope, though not as strong. Fuyuki found that, when he twisted the vines a certain number of times, they were less likely to snap. He didn't know why, because he would have thought that this would make them even more tender and prone to breaking, but it seemed to work nonetheless.

His real trouble was making the noose part. Real rope would've worked quite a lot better, frankly. Vines, though they were just as capable a material, left a sticky feeling on his hands, had a sappy smell, and were hard to knot. The upside was that once knotted, they stayed in place. This was especially unhelpful because the point of a noose was to be able to make the hole that the rope made _smaller_ when an animal stepped into it, and if the knot didn't slide, then it wouldn't do anything.

But Fuyuki had an idea. Running to the beach, he covered the vine in sand and then brushed it all off. This made it so that the vine was less sticky, although… still sticky… but not as much. For a while he experimented around with knotting the noose, and finally, triumphantly, he had found a way to do so, with a knot that slid easily up and down the vine. It didn't really look like a proper noose, but… close enough.

He had to choose carefully where to place the vine. This took quite a bit of walking. He realized that a proper area would be where he'd most recently seen a rabbit pass through, which wasn't actually too far an area from the beach, so he went there instead, and tied the vine to the branch of a tree so that the noose hung in a large, loose circle upon the leaf-covered ground. There. A perfect rabbit-trap.

If only he had some sort of knife to work with….

He hadn't the slightest clue how to sharpen rocks, but he was sure that there would be many of already-sharp ones under that cliff on the opposite side of their beach. Plus, he could also probably sharpen a long stick to make a spear.

_If I want to make it to the other side of the island,_ thought Fuyuki, _then I'd better start now._

This time, he'd just cut straight through the forest. That would be easiest. Before entering, he looked a few times around him. Really, where was Kululu?! _He should probably be back by sundown,_ Fuyuki assured himself. _He'll remember where camp is. It's not that big of an island._

Walking through the trees, Fuyuki began wondering about the wildlife on the island. He had seen the occasional rabbit, and sometimes some lizards too, but what else was there? And why weren't there any other people, also? Maybe it was because the island was haunted… or there was some malicious, unspeakable beast on it that people had always run away from…. And yet, upon first arriving there, there were no traces of people ever treading before upon the ground. No remains of any past civilizations… nothing. Just a plain old island in the tropics that nobody seemed to be living on.

Pushing overhanging vines and large leaves out of the way of his head, the cliff site peeked itself into view. Fuyuki began running, eager to get to the other side. He was almost there now.

_BAM!_ Before he even realized it, Fuyuki's left foot caught on something fastened to the ground, and he tumbled over onto his stomach. He turned onto his side, hoping to see what he'd tripped on, but it was just the curved root of a tree. He propped himself up on his elbow, then promptly went back to the ground. His ankle was throbbing. Fuyuki clutched it in his hands, groaning on the ground. Was it sprained? he worried, but he couldn't tell. It sure felt like it, although he didn't know for sure.

He breathed in and out, trying to ease the pain as he lay there for a few minutes. Slowly, the throbbing began to cease, until there was no trace left of it. Thank goodness. Fuyuki rolled onto his back. A shock zipped through him.

Gazing down upon him was a white figure. It looked to be a woman. Glowing white eyes, flowing white hair, weightless white garments. She reached out her hand to Fuyuki's cheek, and it felt as cold as a winter breeze.

For moments he continued laying there, staring up at her, unafraid yet fascinated. It seemed so quickly that she'd been there, because a second later, she faded out, as though she had never been there to begin with.

Fuyuki stood up and smoothed his hands over his skin, brushing all the dirt off. What could that have been? A person? No…. A ghost? Some spirit of the island? As he made his way toward the cliff area on a wobbly leg, he tried to place her. He'd known somehow that there was something mysterious about the island. Now he knew for certain that it was not ordinary.

The white figure still lingering in his mind, he walked down the hillside, down the grassy slope till his feet hit the sandy beach that led to the rocky side of the cliff. The waves seemed more aggressive on this side of the island. Scattered amongst the water were sharp, vertical rocks, making it so that waves sped up and curved more to get around them, cutting into the sand at more dramatic angles, and with a much stronger impact hitting land. Fuyuki avoided the spray of the water when he could, and also tried his best to walk as lightly as possible, since amongst the sands were various hidden rocks that cut into the bottom of his shoes. He bit his lip, telling himself and his shoes that they just had to make it through this one thing, and then it would be over.

He didn't even have to break off any rocks from the cliff side; there were enough of them in the sand as it was. Bending down with anxiousness to hurry this along, and ignoring the slight reoccurring soreness in his left ankle, he gathered up as many of the rocks he could find, slipping them into the side-pockets of his beige trousers. They had been white when he first arrived on the island. Not so much any longer.

Would these rocks be sharp enough to kill a rabbit? he wondered. They looked to be too chunky and round-shaped to do the job. Fuyuki compared it with another in his other hand. He'd probably have to sharpen them in the end anyway, probably with a different sharp rock. And he could always sharpen a stick. _I can do that with these rocks, can't I?_

He searched through the trees, looking for a proper stick that was small enough in diameter and seemingly easy to carry. Finally he found a strong-looking one, with a consistent color and straight as he could ask for.

His eyes went to the edge of the beach. Momentarily he considered taking the long way back, but he knew he'd rather take the short way. The white figure was still in his mind, and he hoped to catch another glimpse of her through the trees.

_A vanishing white figure looming within the rich green of a deserted island…. This is so cool!_ Giddily, Fuyuki proceeded forward, holding his stick triumphantly as he skipped along.

* * *

**GiroroXHollyLeaf: Did you get my PM? Just wanted you to remind you that I can't reply to your reviews if you aren't logged in. :D**


	8. Island Beast

This was bad.

Fuyuki drew in his breath, forcing his instincts to calm down as he took in the sight before him.

His theory regarding some sort of beast being on the island was probably correct. Lying before him, in the center of the path, was a dead rabbit. Its abdomen was split open, letting slip free all the juicy insides of the little mammal. The leaves surrounding the dead rabbit, once green, were now stained red. Its mouth was still open, as were its eyes, which were positioned toward the sky in a terrorized manner. It was a sickening sight.

He lowered himself to a squat, his hands on his knees, as he examined the kill from afar. It couldn't have been a fox or a wolf; they would've eaten the animal. Or at least have dragged out its insides to feast on. Squinting, he could make out faint red slash marks on the belly of the rabbit, mostly hidden by its fur. Its perpetrator must have had some pretty tiny claws. But what animal killed and didn't eat its prize?

Fuyuki leaned down toward the rabbit, reached out his first two fingers, and swiped away some of the blood. It was still fresh. As he wiped his fingers off on his trousers, his stomach clenched. That must have meant that the animal who killed it, whatever it was, was still close by….

_Cool!_ he thought excitedly, despite the fact that the animal was probably a bloodthirsty beast who wanted his throat. It was still pretty intriguing, and it made the island even more fascinating.

He felt kind of sorry for the rabbit, though. It was even more of a shame because it could've been potential food. And it was still pretty gross, seeing all that.

A little ways ahead, in that same path, Fuyuki witnessed a lizard dangling lifelessly with its tail wedged into a split branch. A red streak went across its chest, signifying a cut that was made there. Fuyuki relaxed his shoulders, released a shudder, and continued onward. That must have been the same beast, too.

It took a little while longer till he came back to the beach, where he promptly seated himself on a rock. He undid the button of the side-pocket on his trousers, setting free onto the sand all the little sharp rocks he had collected. He picked one up, examining it, and placed it on the end of the long stick in his hand. Pressing down, he pushed it forward. It took a bit of the wood off with it, which curled and fell to the ground. Fuyuki smiled. This seemed simple enough. He rotated the stick and did the same, watching as the little curl of wood sprang to the ground. He rotated the stick again and repeated, doing so until he began to form from the stick a sharp, pointed end.

Fuyuki turned the stick in his hand, marveling his accomplishment. He'd done it! He didn't know how, but he was getting the hang of this whole survival thing. And it was even luckier that the deserted island they were on had so many cool things on it, like that white spirit and that… gruesome… beast.

Fuyuki laid the stick against the rock he was sitting on. He felt ashamed of himself for forgetting something so important—where was Kululu? He should have come back by now, but he wasn't there. Fuyuki stood up. This meant it was time to look for him again. _Maybe now, I'll be able to find him this time,_ he thought with optimism.

He entered the forest again, weaving himself in between the trees that he had to pass. Clearly he hadn't explored the entire island, because if there was some beast on it, that probably meant that the beast had a hiding place, too. He imagined how large it would be—bear-sized, or no larger than a fox? Would it kill him if it saw him, or would it lead him to its lair? Fuyuki bit his lip, suppressing a smile of exhilaration. Wherever this animal lived, it must have been quite the spectacle!

Oh. Right. Finding Kululu.

Fuyuki searched everywhere he could through the forest, but there wasn't a trace of the yellow Keronian. Finally he came back upon the edge of the island, on the beach, and went on from there. He had already passed the cliff again, and was about to give up and head back to their beach, when suddenly, a realization struck him.

_What if he fell into the water?_ Fuyuki's eyes widened. _And then he drowned? I wouldn't have ever known! It would have been all my fault for not knowing where he was!_ He ran toward the water. _I've got to make sure he's not in there!_

Unexpectedly, Fuyuki was startled by a sound that came from behind him.

"Hey."

Fuyuki turned around, and his whole body filled with relief as a familiar image entered his vision. What would you know, it was Kululu!

He was sitting down with his arms crossed, looking somewhat unamused.

"You wouldn't mind lending me a hand here, would ya?"

Fuyuki's eyebrows raised. He walked toward Kululu. "Why?"

Despite the glasses that shielded his eyes, Fuyuki sensed the look that Kululu was giving him wasn't a pleased one.

When he had finally come close enough, Fuyuki realized why. Kululu wasn't sitting—he was waist-deep in some gooey-looking substance, and could not get out. _Uh-oh,_ thought Fuyuki.

"Uh… wait here, Sergeant Major! Let me go get some vines!"

"Okay, you do that." Kululu rested his elbow against the muck, placing his cheek on his other hand in boredom. "And I'll just stay here, I guess…. Not like I can move anyway…."

A minute or so later, Fuyuki came back, entangled happily in a long vine that rested mostly on his shoulders. "I got the vine, Sergeant Major!"

Kululu sat up, giving Fuyuki a look as if to say, _Are you serious?_ "That's not going to work."

"Why not?" Fuyuki tossed one end of it over a tree branch that hung over the pit. The end of the vine dangled as he raised his side of it like a theater curtain.

"Vines aren't strong enough. I'll—"

"You're pretty light, though," Fuyuki said to him. "I think it'll work."

The end of the vine slowly wormed its way toward Kululu, and finally dropped itself into his hands. Kululu sighed and fastened his hands around it. "Okay. I have the vine."

"You do? Okay, then, I'm going to pull really hard on this end…."

"All right, go for it."

Fuyuki gave a great tug on the vine. It leapt out from Kululu's hands, flying through the air, until it could go no higher and fell back down again, dangling just above Kululu's head.

"Well that sure worked, ku ku ku."

"You've got to hold it tighter, Sergeant Major!"

"I'm not strong enough," he told him. "The sand pit's got me hard. I might not be able to get out."

"Oh, don't say that!" Fuyuki's eyebrows slanted sadly. "C'mon, let's try again."

Kululu sighed and gave another try. But the same thing just happened.

Fuyuki let go of the vine for a moment to sit down and catch his breath. Pulling the vine took a lot of work, and he was tired already from it. Lots of arm strength involved. But he couldn't give up on Kululu.

He grabbed his end of the vine again. "Sergeant Major, try tying the vine around your waist!"

Kululu looked downward at the vine and tied it around himself, just below his shoulders. With his arms he gripped the part of the vine that extended upward.

"Is it tight enough?" asked Fuyuki.

"Ku ku, I don't think it can get any tighter than this," he answered.

"Okay, then…. Here we go!"

Fuyuki wrapped his end of the vine once around his palm and began to pull. He started off slower this time, gently easing the vine down. He kept careful eye on the branch overhead, so that it wouldn't snap and fall. His eyes went to Kululu. The vine was tightening, but he was also beginning to rise. The sandpit grew tighter around him, desperately trying to tug him back under. Fuyuki gripped the vine harder and pulled it in the slightest bit faster, hoping that this would force Kululu upward more quickly and not allow time for the pit to tighten anymore around him. He could see him worming his way out of the muck.

"Nng… hold on! Don't struggle your way out!" Fuyuki warned him.

Kululu stopped squirming. He could feel his feet loosening, circulation returning to his legs. Fuyuki gave the last and final tug, and with a mighty _pop_, Kululu broke free from the pit.

"Yay, ku ku ku," said Kululu, although he didn't sound so enthusiastic. Fuyuki lay panting on the ground, the vine still in his hands.

"Ku ku, Fuyuki? You think you could help me get down from here now?"

"Yeah… hold on a moment…." He gave himself a few last precious seconds to catch his breath, and then stood back up, holding the rope in such a way that this action wouldn't cause Kululu to fall.

"Okay, Sergeant Major. I'm going to slide the vine over to the trunk of the tree. I'm not going to raise it any higher, but do you think you can climb down from there?"

"I'm only two feet off the ground, Fuyuki," said Kululu, kicking his legs in the air. He glanced below him at the normal, sand-pit-less ground that he was now swinging over. "In fact, you could probably let go right here and I'd be fine."

"Okay." Fuyuki released the vine.

_Crash!_

"Ow," muttered Kululu.

Fuyuki rushed up to him. "Ah! I'm sorry, Sergeant Major!"

Kululu glared at him, standing up slowly on his wobbly legs. He untied the vine around his waist and tossed it to the ground, then began flicking the remaining muck off of him. "Hmf. It's fine. Just don't screw up like that again in the future, ku ku."

Fuyuki looked downward, ashamed.

"Well, now that I'm out, let's head on back to the beach, shall we?"

"Y-yeah…." Fuyuki took a few quick steps to catch up to Kululu, who had already begun walking. "I'm just glad that you were okay after all."

"Okay? I was _stuck_ in a sand pit, ku ku!"

"Yeah, but…" He offered an optimistic smile. "…at least you hadn't drowned! That's always good, right?"

Kululu glanced at him. "Why do you think I would've drowned?"

"Well… because you can't swim and all…."

He scowled and looked away from the boy. Fuyuki grew uneasy, knowing that he had probably said the wrong thing, and reminded Kululu of something he didn't like talking about.

After a moment of silence between them, Fuyuki added, "You didn't shout or call to me or anything, so I probably wouldn't have known for a while that you were stuck."

Kululu didn't choose to respond to this.

Fuyuki was confused. Why hadn't he called for help? Maybe it was just this thing with Kululu, of not ever asking for help when he needed it…. That didn't seem like a very healthy habit.

"Oh, no." Fuyuki breathed air in through his teeth, frowning. "How long were you stuck _in_ there, Sergeant Major? It wasn't the whole time, was it?"

"No."

Fuyuki breathed a sigh of relief.

"It was only a little while… maybe five minutes, at most. The majority of my time I spent taking a walk." He paused. "Hey, wait a minute…. You made a map of the island, didn't you?"

"Uh…." Fuyuki's eyebrows lowered. The fault hit him.

"Did you… just… not see the sand pit?"

He shook his head. "I am so sorry, Sergeant Major! I saw it, and I didn't tell you." He ran a hand through his messy bangs. "Oh… this is all my fault, isn't it…."

"Yep! Ku ku ku." Kululu seemed to be amused, once knowing that he had something to legitimately blame Fuyuki on.

"Oh no! Wait!" Fuyuki brought up his hands slightly, remembering something else. "There's something else you need to know!"

"Hm? Ku ku."

"There's something on the island." Kululu looked up at Fuyuki. "I saw it. It's this white thing, that looks kind of like a woman. I think it's a spirit or ghost of some sort."

Kululu stopped walking and put his hand on his chin. "I saw that, too…."

"You did? Cool! Where did you see it?"

He raised his finger to point in the direction, then realized he didn't know, and lowered it. "I'm not sure."

"Was it in the forest? On the beach?"

"The forest."

"Oh, really!" Fuyuki seemed thrilled by this.

Kululu's eyes lowered. "I suppose I should've told you when I did see it. I would've remembered by then."

"But I was probably pretty far away from you by that time, huh?"

"No." Fuyuki's smile dropped. "I went to you and saw you on the beach, but I decided not to tell you."

"Why not?" He looked so disappointed.

Kululu shrugged. "I just didn't feel like it…."

"Sergeant Major." Fuyuki looked him straight in the eye. "We need to start telling each other these things."

Kululu nodded slightly, as if absentmindedly agreeing.

"I mean, yes, it's also my fault that you fell in the sand pit because I didn't tell you about it…."

"Yeah…."

"But it's just the two of us on this island, okay?" Fuyuki bent down and put his hands on Kululu's shoulders. "Just you, me, that spirit, and some bloodthirsty animal."—Kululu gave him a strange look.—"So if we want to survive this island, we've gotta work together."

"Um… okay?"

Kululu awkwardly brushed the boy's hands off his shoulders and began walking again. It sounded lame, the way he said it, but… he was right. It was just them, and on this island, they only had each other to depend on. No matter how much he didn't want to admit it, working with Fuyuki was probably the only way he was going to pull through until they were found.

* * *

**Beast on the island, I know, cliche. My apologies if it appears that I am ripping off. XD I really am not trying to. (The bit with the glasses may be the only reference to that book in this. And Fuyuki jokes about a conch one time, but that's it.)**

**Just wait till someone tries to make the analogy that Kululu is a "Christ figure."**

**Pffffft totally. XD**


	9. The First Rabbit

**Looks like this will be the longest chapter so far… and the grossest one. If you don't like that kind of stuff, then maybe you had better skip this chapter….**

* * *

After the incident with the sand pit, both Kululu and Fuyuki seemed to be getting along a bit better. Kululu no longer tried to ignore the boy if he had something to say, and whenever they had something on their mind related to the island or to their well-being, they usually told the other. There was no longer a wall of lies put up between them; none that the other could easily see.

Fuyuki had no problem with telling Kululu much. There were certain things, of course, that he would omit from conversations, as far as personal secrets went, but that was only because they didn't have to do with the island and thus weren't vital for Kululu to know in order to survive. Additionally, he feared that Kululu, when knowing such, might later use it against him when they were back home. He might say he wouldn't, but you never knew with Kululu. He was such an unpredictable guy; one second he said one thing, and then deliberately did the opposite to eternally disprove one's sense of reality on him. It was really jerky.

And although they both had it in their minds that from now on there would be more communication between the two of them, it was still quite a difficult task (for Kululu especially) to bring themselves to have a conversation with the other, without thinking of how dreadful it was to talk to him the while. After all, it _was_ sort of a deserted island that they were on, and Kululu was the only person that Fuyuki had to talk to.

"So, um, I made a rabbit-trap earlier this afternoon," said Fuyuki, trying to get a conversation going between the two of them.

"I see." Kululu looked up. "Well, it's not afternoon anymore. It's nearly nighttime. You think that rabbit has been caught yet?"

"Let's go see," said Fuyuki.

His stomach made some sort of weird sound, and he couldn't decide whether it was from hunger, or from nausea knowing that he'd have to kill the rabbit if he had even caught one.

He led Kululu to the area where he'd set up the rabbit trap, avoiding overhanging branches when he could and clearing away the underbrush that got constantly in the way of their path. Crouching slightly, he focused his eyes on the small clearing which he had set the trap up in, and as the green faded in and out of view, he pointed ahead.

Fuyuki tried to say something, but no words could come out of his mouth.

Kululu rubbed his chin with his hand. "Mm-hm, I see then. Fuyuki the hunter, eh?"

Fuyuki bit his lip in excitement. He did it! He caught a rabbit!

Oh… wait…. Not so exciting on second thought.

He furrowed his brow and took a step back. "Um, you wanna take it?"

"Hm, nah." Kululu stepped into the clearing and peered up at the rabbit, who was dangling helplessly in the air with its foot in the trap. It looked pretty painful. "It's too high up for me to get. I think you'll have to do this one."

Absentmindedly making a face, Fuyuki went to the rabbit and undid the knot that tied the vine to the overhanging branch. It was a pretty small rabbit, so it wasn't all that heavy. That wasn't to say that it didn't have pretty painful claws, and he knew that for certain, as they dug into the bare skin of his arm.

"Ah! Ow!" Fuyuki cried in pain.

Kululu grinned, enjoying the boy's torment. "Ku-ku. Your fault for not wearing a shirt, so don't go blamin' me for anything."

Fuyuki rubbed his arm, wincing, and decided to hold the rabbit instead with his hands under its four legs, so that it was no longer dangling. This seemed to calm the rabbit down a bit, though still unknowing of its fate. Fuyuki felt awful, thinking of what he had to do.

They reached the beach. Wordlessly, Fuyuki held the rabbit out to Kululu next to him, making no eye contact.

"Ku ku, what? A present, for me?"

He handed him the rabbit.

"Aw, thank you." Kululu put a hand to his cheek and blushed as he took the vine holding the rabbit in his hand. He looked down at it a moment. "What am I supposed to do with this?"

A shudder went through Fuyuki. He looked down at his arms, which he was rubbing together on the spots where the rabbit had scratched with its itty-bitty claws. "Well… um…. I've never really killed an animal before, except for fish, so… do you think… you might… be able to do this one?"

"Kill a rabbit?" Kululu looked at the animal quizzically. "I'm sure it can't be _that_ hard."

Something about how he said that so playfully sent shivers down Fuyuki's spine.

He wouldn't let Fuyuki leave to avoid seeing this. Dragging him by the arm, he led the boy to a large, smooth rock by the shore. With his hand he searched for the least curviest part of it and set the squealing rabbit down.

"Now, do you have a knife or something I might be able to do with this?" he asked Fuyuki.

"Um, I made a sort of javelin yesterday…."

"You did? Ku ku." He gestured with his hand. "Bring it here."

Quickly, so as not to upset the excited frog, Fuyuki dashed off and retrieved the stick. He came back and handed it to Kululu.

"Javelin? Ku ku ku. This is just a pointy stick."

"…Isn't that the same thing?"

Kululu shrugged. "Oh, well. It still might work. Now let me see." He examined the rabbit, turning it over and holding it in his hand. He pinched it lightly on the back, earning another squeal from the thing, and ran his thumb and forefinger down along the soft fur covering its spine. Without turning his head, he glanced up at Fuyuki. "Am I supposed to skin it first, or kill it first?"

"Kill it first!" Fuyuki wailed. "If you don't kill it first, it'll be able to feel everything!"

"Well, okay. If you say so." Kululu lifted up the javelin.

_SPLAT!_

Fuyuki stood there blankly, then slowly fell to his feet. The blood… it was everywhere!

"Uh-oh, looks like it's still alive. Ku ku ku."

_SPLAT!_

His mouth began opening in horror, and he quickly covered his eyes.

"…No, not quite."

_SPLAT!_

He felt his stomach jump up to his throat. He could already taste his breakfast rising.

"Hm, I think maybe one more time ought to—"

"STOP IT! It's dead already, Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki sobbed.

"Oh? It is?" Kululu lifted up the crimson-stained rabbit and inspected it. "Ku ku ku, so it is. Well, I guess third time's the charm after all." His hand went back to the javelin.

"…What are you going to now…?"

"I need to skin it, ku ku ku. You don't want rabbit fur all over your food, do you?"

"But how do you skin an animal?" Stupidly, Fuyuki stood up to watch.

"Let me show you." Kululu set the rabbit down on the rock and went to the beach. He got down on his knees and looked through the sand till he found a proper tool: the upper-half of a clam shell. Though honestly Fuyuki couldn't tell which half it was.

"You're going to use that…? I don't think it looks sharp enough," he noticed.

"You're right."

Kululu brought the clam shell down on the rock, grooved-side up, and began to scrape it down the boulder, making hideous sounds as he did so. Fuyuki covered his ears. It sounded like nails on a chalk board…. Or maybe chalk on a nail board, considering that chalk was made from shells. After about a minute or so, Kululu stopped.

"Ku ku. Does it look sharp enough?" He held it up for Fuyuki to see. The bladed edge glimmered in the light.

"Y-yes…." Fuyuki trembled.

"Good. Now here's how to skin a rabbit."

Kululu took the sharpened end of the shell and traced a circle around each of the rabbit's legs, not cutting very deep into the skin. He put the shell down for a moment to hold it up for Fuyuki to see, who was, needless to say, already pretty grossed out.

"Ku ku. See what I did? Now I'm going to have to break the legs."

He placed his hands on the leg of the rabbit and snapped it, then did the same with the other. Fuyuki covered his ears while he did so. Kululu then pinched the knee joint of the mammal, and with the other hand pinched the skin, as he slowly dragged them apart, separating the two. With the shell he made small punctures in each leg, then dug his fingers into the hollowed skin and ripped it apart at each leg. The skins of the legs came off like stickers, which he dangled in front of Fuyuki.

"Want these? Ku ku."

"_NO!_" Fuyuki grimaced and turned away, squeezing his eyes shut.

Kululu tossed the leg-skins into the water, delighted at Fuyuki's horror, and continued experimenting with how to skin the rabbit, while Fuyuki was made to watch behind him. Going upward from the legs, he turned the rabbit upside-down in the air, playing around with the skin until it loosened up and fell toward its shoulders in a crumpled heap. It reminded Fuyuki of taking off a wetsuit… if that wetsuit was your skin. It was odd because, fascinatingly, the inside of the rabbit's skin looked a lot cleaner than he would've thought. It was a light tan, about his skin color. Although the rabbit seemed a lot skinnier as its skin was slowly peeled off, it seemed so easy to take off the organ, almost as if it could've been done just as well while it was alive. Fuyuki shuddered at the thought. Were humans that easy to skin, too?

Kululu did the same thing to the arms what he'd done to the legs, and then, making sure that Fuyuki was watching for this, he snapped the skull backward, making an awful _crack_ as the vertebrae of the rabbit broke. He picked up the javelin and jabbed it into the rabbit's loosened neck, cutting off the head and the whole fur which was connected to it, which he threw back into the waves just as he'd done for the leg-skins. Throwing it into the underbrush would attract other animals, who might even start to have a taste for their flesh, as well.

"Ta-da!" In Fuyuki's face Kululu triumphantly held up the skinless, headless, and tailless rabbit. "Ku ku, isn't it beautiful?"

Fuyuki jumped backward. "Get it away from me!"

Kululu let the rabbit dangle for a moment, and then tossed it back onto the rock. "You wanna take out its entrails? Since I already did the hard part, ku ku ku."

He made a face. "Take out its entrails? How do I do that?"

"Oh, it's easy." With the clam shell, Kululu made a slit in the rabbit's stomach and showed it to Fuyuki, who was disgusted. "All you have to do is stick your hand inside, grab whatever you can find, and throw it out, till there's nothing left in there. Ku ku!"

"Ewwww," said Fuyuki. "Uh, I think you can do that. And I'll just be here in the bushes, rocking…."

"Ku ku ku ku ku. Very well, then."

Fuyuki sped away as fast as he could, but even rocking in the bushes as he was, he still couldn't quite block out the sounds of Kululu as he delightedly flung out the stringy intestines of the dead rabbit….

When it seemed like all was done, and when Fuyuki thought it was safe, he finally crept out of the bushes and glanced over Kululu's shoulder. He tried to keep his food down.

"Oh, god… that's not even a rabbit anymore…."

"You won't be saying that once you're eating it, ku ku." Kululu plucked a leaf off a nearby branch and wiped his bloody hands on it. "Speaking of which, you think you're about ready to cook this thing?"

"No…" Fuyuki said, completely honest.

"Good! So am I. You can go look for berries and fruit and such, and I'll get right to work in starting the fire."

"Nnng…." Fuyuki groaned and staggered as he walked off into the woods, while behind him, Kululu gathered tree branches and sticks on the beach for the fire.

Still nauseous from what he'd witnessed, Fuyuki just grabbed whatever he could find that looked mildly like food, which mostly consisted of fruits, coconuts, and the small circle of mushrooms by that one big tree, and gathered them all into a big, round leaf. Once it was full, he headed on back to the beach, placing the items of food at Kululu's feet. Kululu was currently cutting up the rabbit and lancing various parts of it through thin sticks which he had placed at the ground by the fire.

Fuyuki looked up at the sky. It was getting dark already. Time sure flew when you were spilling guts. Or was that the right…. He quickly shook his head. He'd been on this island so long, he was already beginning to lose sense of common phrases.

Suddenly, there was something in his hand. He looked down and saw it was the bit of meat that Kululu had handed to him on a stick. The guy had been right; it didn't look like a rabbit anymore after all. It just looked like… something he was really hungry to eat. Fuyuki dug in, savoring the familiar taste of meat.

"Thanks, Sergeant Major," he said while chewing. He covered his mouth and swallowed. "Uh… sorry. I'm kind of really hungry right now."

"Nah, it's okay." Kululu bit into his own piece of rabbit. "I'll just bug you about it later."

"Okay. …Wait, what?"

"Ku ku ku."

For a while they ate in silence, filling their bellies, while Fuyuki tried to get his mind off of how the food had gotten into their hands in the first place.

Out of nowhere, Kululu glanced down at the stick in his hands, still with a miniscule bit of rabbit meat on it. "Augh."

"What?" asked Fuyuki, glancing up from his food.

"I was just thinking. Of how thankful I am, that this isn't a sweet potato."

He gave him a strange look. "Why?"

"Because if it was, I wouldn't think twice about drowning myself in those waves right now."

Fuyuki tried to think of what he meant by this, but he wasn't sure.

"Plus, I'm sure that if I skinned a sweet potato instead of a rabbit, you would have been a lot less freaked out. Ku ku! And that's no fun."

Fuyuki tossed his finished stick behind him and reached for another, frowning. "I'm sorry, it's just… I've never… done this thing before, you know? It's all kind of weird to me…." He gave a slight shudder. "Especially that rabbit part… but…."

"What, your father never took you on a survival quest when you were a kid?" Kululu questioned him, reaching down into the leaf that had all the food that Fuyuki had gathered.

"Well… no…. Dads don't really do that to their kids here on Earth."

Kululu bit into a mushroom. "Oh, they don't? Ku ku ku. My dad never did either. I was thankful at the time, although now… I might be having second thoughts."

Fuyuki gave him an uneasy smile. "Plus, my dad never really… well…. He wasn't there much."

"Yeah, didn't really seem like it, ku ku." Kululu took a moment to pause. "Was he there at all?"

"He sort of was." Fuyuki finished off a piece of fruit and tossed the core into the trees behind him, his face illuminated by the crackling fire. "I mean, in the really early days, he spent a lot of time with us, but…."

He dropped his sentence there, realizing his voice had just cracked. Kululu said nothing, waiting for him to go on, his silence signifying that it was okay.

"…one day, he just kind of… vanished."

They both were silent. Even the fire stopped buzzing for a moment as the two of them took it in.

"Where is he now? Do you know?" Kululu finally asked.

Fuyuki shook his head slightly, hidden behind his knees which he held with his arms, staring into the fire. "Mom said he was on some sort of search, I think, and I believed her when I was younger…. You know… making up fantasies of where he was going… dreaming of how he would come back to us with open arms and stories to tell…."

By the light of the fire, Kululu noticed something glimmer on the boy's cheeks, and realized it was the reflection against a tear that was falling.

"But eventually, I just kind of… stopped believing those things. I stopped hoping for him to come back."

"So you gave up, huh?" Kululu adjusted his position so that he was now laying down on the ground on his side, his head propped up by his hand, with his elbow resting on the dirt.

Fuyuki gave a slow nod of his head.

"Well. What can I say." He took one of the sticks that used to have rabbit meat on it and began tracing swirls in the dirt. "Dads are all weird. Who knows where he is. Maybe he got kidnapped by some alien race or something."

Fuyuki shrugged, glumly nibbling on the cap of a mushroom. "I used to think that, too. But… I just don't know anymore."

"Eh, I guess I can relate. My dad disappeared when I was younger, too, so I never really knew him all that well."

"…Really?" Fuyuki dropped his knees to the ground, startled. "I didn't know that…." He bit his lower lip. "Geez…. I'm sorry, Sergeant Major."

"Nah, it's fine." Kululu waved his hand dismissively. "Never liked the guy anyway. Once he was gone, I could do as I pleased, ku ku ku!"

Fuyuki forced a nervous laugh. Sometimes he admittedly did feel like Kululu acted a bit like a teenager…. Perhaps now he finally knew why.

"Did your mom know why your dad left?" he asked.

"Ku ku ku, no. She disappeared along with him."

There was an awkward silence after that.

Fuyuki's eyes went off to the side. Kululu turned over onto his back, staring up at the stars.

"Oh. So… um…." Fuyuki sat up. "Guess we've eaten everything…. Wanna put the fire out?"

"Nah," said Kululu, after thinking a bit. "Might as well let it burn out on its own."

He shut his eyes, and though Fuyuki couldn't tell, he assumed as much. Thinking that Kululu was ready to go to sleep, he decided it would best be time to head on to the shelter. The sun had already went down a while ago, and he was getting pretty sleepy himself.

Fuyuki walked over to the shelter and laid down on the tightly-placed leaves inside of it, gazing up at the ceiling of the structure. A nauseous feeling bubbled up inside of him. Must've been the memory of the rabbit. He closed his eyes and turned onto his side, ready to sleep. But what Kululu had said just wouldn't leave his mind. Both his parents were gone for most of the guy's life. That included his father. If he hadn't told him that, he never would have guessed that about Kululu.

Maybe they were more alike than he'd thought.

* * *

**And that's why I'm a vegetarian.**

**Eww. I had to look up so many videos of how to skin rabbits to be able to write about it. And then I had lunch afterward, too, which was extra-gross.**

**As a side-note: ****So, if this thing gets to 99 reviews, NO MORE REVIEWS AFTER THAT. My sister told me she'd parodize this thing if I got 100 reviews, and last time she parodized something I wrote, it turned out horribly morbid and depressing. She says that this one's going to be Out from Derp Waters. Then again, I doubt this will even get to any more than 40 reviews, so nothing to worry about there. XD**


	10. Caught in the Chains

**Yaaay it's time for some good ol' flashbacks. This is where things start changing around a bit.**

**XD Oddly I'm having fun writing this. I don't know why, since I usually hate writing survival stuff. (Probably not doing so good with it, either.) Last year I completely rewrote the entire Hunger Games series using GiroNatsu. WHY. WHY DID I DO THAT WITH MY LIFE.**

**Anyway, wow I talk too much in these author's notes, we've got a chapter here.**

* * *

He didn't mean to go to sleep so early, nor did he ever expect it to happen. This was the first time on the island that he actually remembered having drifted off.

He couldn't move from that spot anyway. He didn't know why. His body just seemed to freeze up, and all he could do was stare into the hues of the fire, while Fuyuki coolly walked off to the shelter.

There was nothing he could really do. So he just lay there, gazing at the stars.

_"What do you think of when you look up at the stars?"_

_"I wish I could go to those stars."_

_"That would be nice. Why can't you?"_

_"Spirits can't leave. That's why I have to stay here…."_

_"Someday, we can go to the stars together."_

_"Promise?"_

_"I…."_

That was when he went to sleep.

* * *

Suddenly he was in a crib, standing on short legs as he used his arms to grip the edges of the structure to help him stand.

His mother was looming above him, her face hidden by a shadow that was created from the angle of the light fixture, which was placed in the middle of the room. She reached out her arms to pick him up, and Kululu, terrified, fell against the back side of the crib. It was to no avail. The woman's enormous arms were coming for him, and there was no escape. As if he could do nothing of it, her arms enveloped his small body, and he was being pulled up into the air, into her arms.

His mother carried him out of the room and down a set of stairs, where she set the tiny blue tadpole into a playpen. She pat him on the head, saying, "Now you have fun playing in there, Kulu-chan!"

Kululu watched spitefully as his mother walked away. Foolish woman. It had been almost a year, three months, and seventeen days since the day of his hatching, and yet she still treated him like he was some sort of baby! Well, he wasn't, and he knew this. But did she? Probably not.

The playpen towered over him like a restricting prison, but Kululu had been in it long enough to know all of the tricks the place had for him. He knew how to get past its defenses. Pitiful, too, since it was only a mere playpen, something made for the joy of baby Keronians, which he was certainly NOT.

Crawling over to the far side of the colorful object, he stuck his hand through one of the diamond-sized openings, reaching for the switch he had attached to the wall. But his mother must have seen this the last time he did so, and she must have moved the playpen closer away from the wall, wedging it between two pieces of furniture so it couldn't be moved. Blast it. Kululu reached forward some more, but his hand was just too tiny to even graze the big red lever of the switch. His cheek pressed painfully against the bending poles of the pen. Yet, if only he could just reach it…. A little more…. A little more….

Finally, the small tadpole slipped, and in performing this action, his hand pulled down the lever that opened the compartment hidden in the wall. The compartment pressed toward him, something else he'd programmed it to do. Now it was close enough for him to tinker with the parts inside. Kululu selected his favorite toys for the playpen, Mr. Wrench, Mr. Electronic-Screwdriver, and Mr. Pliers.

If he could've, he would have crossed his fingers, in the hopes that his parents wouldn't hear him make his escape. They usually didn't, so for the most part, this was a safe thing to do. With his three favorite toys for the playpen, Kululu tore apart the bindings of his prison, slipped out, pieced it back together, then put his tools back in the hidden compartment and closed it. Finally, he was out. Now he was free to do as he pleased, as long as he was able to avoid the other four….

He looked to both sides around him. There was no one there. The coast was clear; if he wanted to run, now was the time.

He made his way as quick as he could to the other side of the room, crawling like a wounded animal. Occasionally he stood up and tried to walk, but always ended up falling down in the process. He came at last upon the stairway. That freakish, leviathan-looking stairway…. Kululu gulped, but he knew that this was his only chance. Slowly, he crawled up the steps, treating each step as if it were some great accomplishment. There were twenty-seven steps, and the last one was always the steepest. Right now he was only on number 11, and he was already out of breath. He knew he must take a break—but he couldn't, not when he had come this far, with just a little ways to go.

_Twenty-five… twenty-six… twenty-seven!_ he thought in his head with triumph, finally coming upon the last step. He glanced behind him at his great feat. He felt so proud of himself. He always felt pretty amazing after getting up the stairs.

His room wasn't that far away, so it wasn't all that difficult to get to. The knob might've been pretty high, and perhaps he could reach it if he actually tried, but Kululu had other methods instead. He stuck his hand toward the door frame, fumbling about till he found the tiny scanner he had slipped in. He pressed his thumb against it, waited as it was scanned, and then the door opened wide to let him in. After he had gotten into the room, he pushed the door closed behind him.

At last, he was alone now…. Kululu crawled to the corner of the room where all his stuffed animals were placed. Pitiful children's toys… he had no use for them. What was hidden behind them, however, was what was more important. His mother knew nothing about this. It was a lucky thing that there were so many of the children's playthings, too, or else his secret storage for his devices might not have been able to be kept hidden.

Kululu pushed past the piles of fluffy useless junk and hid under them so as not to be seen if someone came into the room. The night light on the wall provided lighting for his secret cove. While his mother presumed for him to be in the playpen, he was actually here, fascinating himself with scientific doohickeys and tiny metallic parts, all of which he combined and assembled into new material, new inventions, and new things which had never been thought of, and could probably never be used. But they were fun to make anyway. If only he just had enough… materials.

The door opened. A shiver went up Kululu's spine. Into the room his mother poked her head. "Kulu-chan!" she called. "Are you in here?"

_What does that idiot expect? Does she think I'll answer?_ thought Kululu. It was true that he looked down upon his mother because she treated him like a baby, but even he could not deny the sad fact that he still could not talk. It was quite an inconvenience. But he was still trying his hardest.

Thinking of this, he foolishly attempted just then to replicate the sounds which she had uttered, only resulting in the pitiful babbling of an infant. His mother heard this. Kululu's eyes widened, realizing what he'd just done. And now she would find him. Now it would all be over. No more experimenting, no more creating anything…. He would be forced to fill out her low, low, _low_ expectations for him.

The stuffed animal covering his head was lifted up, and light flooded into his hiding spot. He winced, feeling almost certain that his skin should dissolve. Instead his mother only lifted him up into her arms.

"Oh, Kulu-chan! So here's where you were!" She tossed the stuffed animal back into the pile. Kululu relaxed his shoulders. If she had glanced down, who'd have known what would've happened. "How did you get out of your playpen?" she asked the child, squeezing his little cheeks. He swatted her hand away. He was not a toy! What made this woman think that he didn't care for whatever she did to him?

_But fine. Right now, do what you will with me, since you're not going to be staying for long anyway,_ he thought, glaring up at her. _I don't even care if you leave again._

"Well, time to take you back, you siwwy widdo Kululu." She rubbed her hand over his head and back headed downstairs, into the same room, where she placed the child back at his starting point. And then she walked off, not turning around once to see the tiny hands that were helplessly reaching out toward her.

* * *

The world around Fuyuki was spinning. He didn't know what had happened, but suddenly he was extremely dizzy. All his attempts at sleeping were in vain. All he could do now was just pace about on the beach aimlessly, waiting for the moment when his drowsiness would take its toll on him. But nothing happened, no matter how much he paced. He was tired, and yet he couldn't sleep, or rather, he _wouldn't_. Something was telling him that he shouldn't sleep. Something ominous.

The beach, illuminated by the moonlight, seemed welcoming and yet somehow haunting. When he'd first awoken, his eyes were sore and wanted to shut again, but now they were wide open. He probably couldn't go back to sleep now if he tried. Secretly he also hoped that staying awake would enable him to catch a glimpse of the white spirit again, and see her floating on the sands as the moonlight shone through her, casting glowing shadows onto the pale sand.

But there was none of that. Only torture, from himself, and how he was awake when he shouldn't be. His whole body was shaking uncontrollably, as if it was cold, and yet he knew that it wasn't. His teeth chattered together, and he gripped both his elbows, clenching the skin tighter and tighter until he thought it would burst. Giving in to the silent agony, he fell down on his rear against the sand, chin pointed upward at the sky. He could see the moon pretty well, and a few constellations, too.

The moon calmed him. It reminded him of home, of when he sometimes would look up at the moon from his balcony when he found he could not sleep. He wondered if there was anyone else looking at the same moon. Who were they? Where did they live? What did they know that he had yet to learn? What had they seen that he might never witness?

It was such a strange sight. The moon, hanging above them all, controlling the waves that crashed beneath it, the waves that were almost coming close enough to tickle Fuyuki's feet. A sudden thought occurred to him. _I wonder if I can see where we landed on the moon from here._ He tried squinting. No use. _I should have brought a telescope with me._ And then he remembered that, even if he did, it would have all been lost in the ship when the engine failed and they fell into the sea.

The rabbit in the moon squirmed, squealing in fright as it was stripped of its skin. Its insides were scooped out and replaced with the mochi it had been pounding, and was then roasted on a fire. It sounded good at first, but then the thought made Fuyuki rather nauseous.

He let himself fall so that he was now laying on his back. Glancing over across the beach at Kululu, who seemed to be sleeping just fine, Fuyuki almost felt jealous.

"Why can't I just go to sleep…" he said to himself.

A voice happened to answer for him.

_"It's all right, Fuyuki. Just shut your eyes and before you know it you'll wake back up again and it will be morning."_

Without questioning, he did as the voice asked, and it was only after he had fallen asleep that he realized that it had been the voice of his father.

* * *

**…I feel as though parts of this are rather uninteresting. If something feels weird to you guys, please do tell me…. I'd also like to know if I'm getting stuff inaccurate, if people are out-of-character, or if something just plain doesn't make sense.**

**Anyway, it should be getting a bit more interesting from here on out. The first nine chapters were kinda slow, soo…. Sorry about that. XD**

**Anyone mind telling me their favorite chapter thus far, and why? I'd love to see what you guys as readers enjoy in stories, just to get a sense of what I'm doing right…. :)**


	11. Turning Tides

**A lot of weird terms in this chapter, but most of it's just words mashed together, so please don't be too confused.**

* * *

"Ma'am, I believe your son is gifted…."

"What? Shupepe?" The woman giggled, feeling flattered.

"Uh, no. I meant your _other_ son." The school principal pointed his pencil at Kululu, who was behind the woman, playing around with a few electronic devices that he'd torn out from inside the walls. "I called you here because of him, remember?—Uh, please don't touch those, son! That's school property."

"Oh… yes… I remember." She cast her eyes to her feet shamefully. "But—" Her head shot up at the principal. "Kulu-chan's not gifted. He does love to play with some very interesting toys, though."

"And why…" The principal bit the eraser end of his pencil. "…do you think that your son is not gifted?"

"Well, because you can't really tell these things at an age like his," she said, fumbling with her hands. "I mean, Kulu-chan's only at level three* in training school, so most of the things that he does are usually discombobulated and don't have much to do with his actual brain activity…. Brain activity? Is that right?"

"Uh, yes." The principal glanced down at the clipboard on his desk and handed it over to the woman. "If you'll take a look at these results a few of my staff members have gathered from examining him over the past month or so, you might be surprise at what you'll see." As she flipped through the papers, he listed them. "Extraordinary test scores, an IQ that is off the charts, school projects that prove him to be extremely advanced in technology skills…."

She examined the papers with a pleased air, inspecting the grades of her son, until she got to the physical education section and frowned deeply.

"Ohh… that's rather disappointing."

Behind them, Kululu activated the device he'd finished building. A teleportation portal opened and an adult phynoyuanogura stepped into the room.

"The… point that I'm trying to make here, ma'am, is that your son is quite intelligent for his age… too intelligent, we also think, for his current level."

"And so…?" she asked skeptically, looking him in the eye.

"We've been considering that he would perhaps do better in an environment more suited for his mindset." He glanced toward her. "Ma'am, what do you think of moving your son up a few levels?"

The woman sprang to her feet, placing her hands firmly on the desk table. "That's nonsense!" she blurted. "Whatever you say, I know the truth! Kulu-chan son is _not_ gifted!"

"Moooooom! This phynoyuanogura is trying to eat my interdimensional matter-transmitter!" Kululu complained from behind him.

His mom glanced to the side without turning her head. "Hold on a moment, Kulu-chan. Mother's talking to the principal."

"But, _Moooom_! Make him stop!"

The principal cleared his throat, glancing up at her.

She sighed and sat back down in the chair. "Fine. Do what you want with him. But I know my own son, and I think you're seeing him in a much different light than what's actually there."

"Er… yes…." He made a face, peering behind her as Kululu desperately tried to shove the phynoyuanogura back into the portal. "Something tells me that I think he'll do just fine."

* * *

It was just nearing the second half of seasonal phase one** in Keron's northwestern region when training school would be opened back up for the new year. The break for kids was over, and now it was time again to send them back to their studies and training to enable them to someday carry the future of the planet on their miniscule shoulders.

Kululu was feeling quite nervous. Last year he'd ended training school at level three, and somehow this year he was suddenly being put into level seven, instead of four. It would be quite a big jump for him. What would it be like? Would the lessens be more suited to his intelligence? Would he not be so bored any longer? Would there be new people? Would they be older than him? Would he finally be able to make friends?

Eventually, with all these questions encircling his head, the anxiousness slowly washed away and excitement came instead. How wonderful it would be! Someplace new, with high hopes for him. He couldn't wait.

The first day of school came quite soon. His anxiousness rose to the top again.

Before he'd even known it, he was there, looking up at the looming, dark school, feeling queasy about this decision. Now meeting new people didn't seem so great after all.

He swallowed, urging himself to press forward. His hands tightened around the straps of the bag over his shoulders, and he walked through the enormous doors of the gate.

Nothing seemed to have changed about the school. For the most part, it was the same when he'd left it during the end of the first half of seasonal phase one***, and ended his year of level three in turn. Not much time seemed to have passed since then. But now things would be changing drastically, and training school life for him would probably never be the same.

Kululu glanced down at the slip of paper in his hands. "Room 400365, floor 140," the paper slip said. Where was that? That was quite a large number, big of a school as it might've been. The constructors of the building did a pretty good job of making the place look a lot smaller on the outside, though that was thanks to the planet's advanced technology. It was still pretty high up, though. Maybe he could take the vertical transporter.**** There was a long line for it, and Kululu didn't have much patience, so he sat down in a corner and built his own vertical transporter for himself.

Once he reached floor 140, he deactivated the transporter and set his feet upon the ground, tucking the device into his backpack. He navigated his way down the halls, looking for the room that was room 400365. Many larger, older-looking Keronians gloomed down upon him, giving him strange looks as he walked on through the halls. Most of them already had no tails. Some of them were even beginning to loose the white on their faces.

_That's so weird,_ thought Kululu, mildly intimidated by the new appearances.

Finally he came upon it. Room 400365. He took a breath, gripped the straps to his backpack, and entered through the door.

Everyone was staring at him. His cheeks burned. Was there something on his face? He was certain that he wasn't wearing his pacifier today….

One kid pointed at him. He had no tail, and there was orange halfway down his face, signifying that he must surely be much older than Kululu. "Ppfft, how'd a _baby_ get in here!" he remarked.

Though he tried to fight against it, Kululu glanced to either side of him. Baby? What baby? That would be weird if there was a baby in the room.

"He shouldn't be in here at all! Level two's on the fortieth floor, kid!"

_Huh?_ thought Kululu. He looked around him again, suddenly nervous. Did he go into the wrong room?

"Little kids like him can't even get up here without a code," said one girl. She flipped her curly ear-hat-things matter-of-factly.

Someone else went up to him and peered down into his eyes. "Yeah, kid, how'd you get in here?"

Kululu backed away a little. He didn't like it when people looked him in the eye.

"Well?"

Remembering that he had been asked a question, he spoke up.

"The vertical transporter."

The Keronian in front of him looked confused. "But you can't get to this floor unless you have the code for it. What's the code?"

Kululu tried to remember. The code had been sent to him that morning through the mail, but he'd only glanced at it once. Nor did he use the public vertical transporter, so there hadn't been any use for it. But someone was asking him what it was. He searched his memory….

"3RU98EVJ94," he answered.

The Keronian stepped back, astonished. "Okay, then…. Um, guys, maybe this kid really is supposed to be in this room after all…."

"That's impossible! He's just a baby!" one girl said, thrusting her hands on her desk in protest. The rest of the room began chattering angrily.

Kululu's shoulders slumped. Somehow he'd known this would happen. These people did not accept him. Nobody would. It had always been this way. There was too much pressure on the things that didn't matter; when there was a genius, nobody seemed to care. But someone with strength and physical ability was worshipped, since they were most useful to Keron.

All of a sudden he was struck in the back of the head as the door opened, and a new figure stepped in. The classroom hushed.

The new Keronian walked over to the podium in front of the class and set her papers down. She wore tiny spectacles on her nose-area and had a sophisticated, adult look. Kululu stared in awe.

"Thank you, class. I'll be your advisor this year, Tichacha," said the woman.

_Ah… it's so much different from the other levels,_ thought Kululu.

Her eyes went immediately to the tadpole in the corner of the room. "You there."

Kululu straightened up. "Y-yes?"

"Level four is that way." She pointed downward. Kululu frowned. _Why does everyone expect me to be down there? What do they take me for, dumb?_

"I-I know that, ma'am."

"Then why are you here?"

He handed her the slip of paper.

"Hm, room 400365, it seems," she mused to herself. She handed it back to him. "All right… let's see…." She looked through her files of students. "Kululu? Take a seat in the back."

"All right." Kululu went to the back of the room and slid into the desk, plopping his backpack down on the ground next to him. It made a noisy _ka-thunk_ as it hit the floor. Many other students turned around and snickered.

_Well, at least it's not me they're laughing at,_ he thought optimistically, _and my backpack instead._

But it wasn't. It was just him.

* * *

In the beginning, Fuyuki had started to worry. Why wasn't he awakening? What was wrong with the guy? Kululu had been laying on the sand, asleep and groaning, for nearly half the entire day, and Fuyuki knew that something was wrong.

In the beginning. But now he grew to accept the new Kululu. The island turned much happier to him, and Fuyuki was having lots of fun by himself.

At this particular moment he had the undeniable urge to cover Kululu's body with sand.

There was nothing holding him back. Fuyuki scooped up sand from off the beach, making a large pit where the grains had just once been. In this small depression he placed Kululu, which he covered in sand from the feet up, making sure not to get any on his head. Fuyuki sat back, marveling at his work. It still didn't seem quite right, though…. He took some more sand in his hand and let it slip through his fingers onto the sandy bulge of the Sergeant Major's body.

"Maybe I can build a sand castle!" he realized with enthusiasm.

Fuyuki set right to work in his creation. With the proper amount of dirt and water and sand, he was able to make a few towers around the yellow Keronian's body. It began to look like a great fort. He felt just like a kid again. But it wasn't quite done. He added more sand to the walls, a bridge out of shells, and completed it by sticking a leaf onto the tallest tower, which was in the middle. He carved in tiny, wobbly rocky stones with his shaky hands and a tiny stick.

Kululu turned over. The whole thing was ruined.

"Sergeant Major, how could you!" Fuyuki chastised, swatting the sand across the beach in his anger. A whole bunch of it sprayed across the ground and into the waves. Fuyuki began pacing around, trying to calm himself. He was angry, horribly angry. At what? He had no clue. He wasn't even quite sure what was going on anymore. There was a strange, bubbly sensation in his body. His mind jumped to other topics, all at once. Sand castles. The moon. Going home. Happy bunny rabbits with no skin. Eating fish alive. Suddenly the whole place turned into candy.

And he had this headache, this constant pounding headache, and just like the waves, it breathed in and out on him.

* * *

*Keronian equivalent of second grade

**Second half of spring

***First half of spring

****Something along the lines of a fancy alien elevator of some sort


	12. Torn Apart

Fuyuki was really, really happy. The island was so funny. There was sweat pouring down his face from the hot sun, but he paid no attention to it. Instead he ran, skipped, and bounced along the sands, enjoying everything that was happening.

All of a sudden, he bumped into something, and was sent to the ground on his rear. Fuyuki shook his head and looked before him. It was Keroro!

"Sarge? How'd you get here?" he asked, astonished. He'd come to rescue him!

"I came with you guys too, remember?" Keroro fumed. "Don't tell me you've forgotten your best friend!"

"Oh, I would never!" Fuyuki scooped him in his arms and gave the frog a great big hug. Seeing Keroro choking, he released him.

Fuyuki wiped away a tear of happiness. This was so wonderful that Keroro was here! He couldn't possibly ask for anything more. This truly was a miracle. Strange, but… a marvelous, marvelous, miracle. He wondered how it was that he hadn't noticed till now. Had he really been that oblivious this whole week?

He got to his feet, clenching his fists enthusiastically. This was so exciting! Things were taking a turn for the better after all. "Sarge, now that you're here, what shall we do? Shall I show you around? Make you some food? Or, or…." His eyes lit up. "Or we could go searching for mysterious animals and paranormal phenomenons!"

"Let's play hide-and-seek, Fuyuki-dono!" said Keroro.

Fuyuki nodded. "Okay, Sarge! That sounds fun."

Off the two of them went, skipping with joy at seeing the other. After a round of rock-paper-scissors, they agreed that Keroro could go hide, and Fuyuki would be the one to find him. The green frog ran all over the island, searching for the perfect hiding spot. Finally he decided on it and crawled into the tiny space, giggling with the knowledge that Fuyuki was doomed to not succeed at this one. He was the king of hide-and-seek!

"Four… three… two… one! Ready or not, here I come!" shouted Fuyuki. He darted away from the tree he'd been standing in front of with his eyes closed, and dashed into the woods where Keroro would surely be.

Keroro was a pretty hard guy to find, and it was no wonder. He was tiny. He was green. And they were on a deserted island. Fuyuki called out to him, looked under rocks, under logs, behind boulders, in swamps, by the beach, by the cliff side, in the sand pit, on the mountain; anywhere he could. But he couldn't find him at all.

Fuyuki looked up at the sun. It had been so long since the last time he'd seen Keroro, though he didn't know how much time had passed for certain. A bead of sweat trickled down his cheek. He began to grow anxious. Where was the guy?

"Sarge!" Fuyuki went into the woods again, calling his name. "Sarge, where are you?"

"I'm over here, Fuyuki-dono," called Keroro's voice. Fuyuki ran in the direction of it, and then called for him again. He got the same response, and continued in the direction whence it came, but he couldn't find Keroro.

"Sarge, this isn't funny!" he shouted. "I can't find you! I… okay, I give up. You win! You win hide-and-seek!"

"Gero, gero, gero," laughed Keroro's voice. It came from all around Fuyuki. He rubbed his upper arms with his hands, shivering. Why was he so cold? It had been so warm on the beach.

"Sarge! Come out, come out, wherever you are!"

Fuyuki picked up a stick. If Keroro wouldn't come out on his own, he knew that he'd have to find him himself, no matter what it took. He hated it when people played with his mind like this. That was mean!

As he searched for Keroro, holding up his stick threateningly, he passed a dull pink figure. Fuyuki stopped in his tracks and went back a few steps. He squinted his eyes, and then the stick fell from his hands.

"…Sis…?" He didn't understand. "What are you doing here?"

Natsumi had her hands on her hips, displeased at Fuyuki's behavior. "What do you mean, what am I doing here, young man?! You've been gone for _days_, and you didn't even say anything!"

"But—but—but," he protested.

She sighed. "Well, it's all over now. No sense in getting angry at you." She looked up. "We'd better go on home. C'mon, Fuyuki."

She began walking away, and Fuyuki hurried along to catch up with her. Suddenly the island was no longer an island anymore, and Fuyuki saw it for what it truly was. The trees fell and melted away. Everything that was green washed into small puddles on the ground. The hot sun dissolved. Slowly, the place turned back into what it really was—the streets of Oku-Tokyo.

_How long have I been thinking this was just an island?_ he wondered, rubbing his neck confusedly. Then he remembered something.

"The Sarge—"

"What about him?" asked his sister.

"Is he all right?"

She shrugged. "Yeah, sure. He's at home doing the laundry. Why are you so worried about him all of a sudden, Fuyuki?"

Fuyuki just shook his head, not quite certain what was going on anymore. He was just glad to be off that island. Soon, as if everything had just been a dream all along, they'd be right back at home…. He'd have a nice, fluffy bed to sleep in…. He'd crank up the air conditioning…. And he'd never have to see a rabbit be killed again.

He smiled gratefully. "It's a wonderful thing that—"

Natsumi gave him a horrified look. She pushed him to the ground without warning. "_FUYUKI, GET DOWN!_"

Fuyuki looked up at his sister. Leering behind her was the Island Beast, and it had its massive jaws opened wide. Natsumi screamed in horror as the Island Beast gobbled her up in one whole bite. Then it looked over at him and grinned.

Fuyuki scrambled to his feet and began running.

* * *

Kululu sat on the edge of the sidewalk, watching the street as the watery remains of their last rain continued dripping into the drainage pipes. The sky was reflected in the small puddles.

He felt his lips trembling, and that sensation under his jaw had begun to rise, but despite the instincts that were almost overpowering him, Kululu assured himself that he wouldn't cry. He wasn't one to cry. Not at a time like this. Not ever.

He rubbed his arms, sore with purple marks and occasional scratches that almost covered them completely. They looked as if to hide the true color of his skin. Why did people not like him? Why wouldn't they accept him? Why did they treat him differently, just because he was younger, and perhaps smarter?

Because of them, he'd even been trying hard to skip school when he could. It had been working for a while, until his mom found out; and when she did, saying that she was angry would be an understatement.

He thought it was cruel. It was unfair. It was true that perhaps he didn't quite know how to talk to people, and whenever he tried he just couldn't get the words right when he spoke to them. It was true that he didn't have the courage to tell them to stop when they began teasing him, which escalated into much, much worse. This had been going on for many days now. If he thought it had been bad back in his previous levels, it was much worse here. He hated it when the older kids hurt him. But he hated it more when everyone else stood there watching, especially the twin Keronians in that same level who did nothing to help the tadpole that was being bullied….

Back then, when he'd been in level three, it was a lot easier. People simply feared him because he was smarter and thus more powerful than the rest of them. They'd all been the same size, and want of physical strength as he was, he'd always found a way to prove to them who was the boss in the end. They hated him, but the only thing he could seem to do about it was turn that hate into fear, so they wouldn't hurt him… physically.

But now things were different. He wasn't on top anymore. These were bigger kids, with different attitudes and much more strength. They weren't afraid of him. Frankly, he was afraid of _them_. That was why he wasn't able to do anything against them, except wait it out until they stopped beating him up. That was his best tactic so far.

He shivered, drawing his knees together as he sat on the smooth, hard rock the edge of the sidewalk. Maybe he deserved this for how he'd acted toward the people his age when he was in level three. Maybe he was getting a taste of his own medicine. But had he really been that mean? Kululu knew that he was a couple things; he was spiteful and scary, and oftentimes a bit oblivious to the emotions of others, too, but he never really did things to be mean. The only times that he was mean and was conscious of it were when he was angry, and wanted to set things straight with someone… or something. Most of the time he was just too afraid to step up to stick up for himself.

He was afraid of so many things, and he was already growing tired of it. He didn't want to be afraid anymore. But what could he do about it? Those kids were stronger, better, more confident, and had more power over him. Even the younger ones, back in level four, the level he was supposed to be in, now seemed to him to have more privileges than he. It was as if they all knew something he didn't, or had something that he didn't. He was growing afraid of standing up in front of them, too. What if they laughed at him? What if they mocked and ridiculed him? People always found ways to let him know that he was not one of them, and he was well aware of this.

He hated all of them so badly. And yet, in the blink of an eye, if they asked him to hang out with them then he would.

He rubbed his arms again, wincing at the spots where he'd been bruised, and decided not to think too hard about it. Training school was tough, especially the component without the actual "training school" part of it, but he'd just have to pull through till it ended. Which would be in about six more long years….

He was doomed.

His home life wasn't doing much better either. When he was back in level three and got bored, he usually did things to make people bicker with each other, because that was fun to watch and it always got his mind off of other things. Those types of bickering were fun and amusing. But this type was not.

His parents despised each other, and they made no effort to hide it. Every day when Kululu arrived home from his day at training school (always a bit later than his siblings—the older kids kept him occupied after the bell), they were shouting, and tossing insults at each other, and complaining. Once he even saw his mother throw a lamp at him, hoping to disable him.

At least his father wasn't as dramatic about it. Most of the time he regarded the woman as if he cared nothing for her, as with many other things that he didn't find interesting. He spoke to her rarely, and when he did, it was usually with a mocking tone. "What did your mother do _now_ for dinner? Ugh! I can't believe you two eat this," or "I can't believe she actually said that. I had thought that she was dumb, but now I know for certain," or "Oh, it seems that a bitch has sneaked into my home again. However did that happen?" or "Can you please leave a moment, darling. I'm doing more important things right now than having to listen to that awful yapping coming from your mouth." Then he would put his face behind a book, or a newspaper, or some other electronic device, and completely ignore her.

Hearing these things, his mother always tried to smile at the man, starting out sweet at first, then growing into an unstable grin of hatred. "Well, that's lovely, dear," she'd say back. "Why, I—I feel the same way!"

Kululu always wondered why they married in the first place if they were just going to end up hating each other.

Dinnertime was the worst. His mother had always insisted that they eat together as a family, despite the fact that she herself despised this proposition. She sat across from her husband, with the twins seated next to her, and Kululu by his father. He hardly ever saw his father's face as a kid. When he was older, and his father was gone, he'd tried to imagine what it looked like—fish lips, or buck teeth, or crossed eyes… which was it?

His other two siblings, the twins, never seemed to look at him when they were eating, either. Which was good, since he didn't like being looked at. But his mother did the same with her husband. They hardly ever made eye contact. When they did, it was as though a lightning storm had erupting between the two of them. When they were younger, all three children used to run and hide, but by this point they'd gotten used to the odd behavior of their parents.

_They're both idiots anyway_, Kululu always assured himself.

"So… kids…. What did you do in school today?" asked their mother that evening during dinner, trying to start a simple conversation.

"Tichacha's still making us memorize the different galaxies," said his brother, frowning as he slurped up his space clams. Kululu knew about Tichacha. She was his advisor, but for his brother and sister she taught galactic and solar studies. "I don't really like learning about galaxies…."

"Ohh… I'm sorry, honey. But they're really fun to learn about!" said his mother.

His father humphed, adjusting his non-electronic newspaper in front of his face. No use learning about galaxies. In his opinion, their kids would've done much better with some more physical training, Kululu especially. He was the one who needed it most. He was disappointed in him.

"Just think," she said, dragging her hand through the air for dramatic effect, "someday you might even be able to rocket through space, as a proud soldier of Keron…. If you didn't know all the galaxies, then how would you do that?"

His brother just shrugged, poking the gelatinous substance in his bowl with his hashquai. "Dunno. Doesn't sound very interesting to me."

The woman almost looked offended. "How could—Why, no! Being a soldier of Keron would be the best thing you could ask for."

_…Not really,_ thought Kululu. _Getting you two out of the house would._ But he didn't say this. Even though he really wanted to.

"Well… what about you?" His mother glanced toward his sister, who also sat next to her.

"Same thing," she replied sweetly, not returning the eye contact.

After that, his mother seemed to be silent. Not that it would have changed anything. Kululu usually wasn't ever asked about how his day was. If he told them, they would have been surprised. They probably wouldn't expect to hear about how the older kids had been treating him. Or how he was excelling in all his subjects, with the exception of physical education. There was even a girl he liked. But no one would ever know these things. Nobody ever asked.

Kululu ate in silence along with the rest of them, watching everyone else. He wondered if they knew that this was just another day of their boring old lives, and that who were they to know when a day like this wouldn't come again. He wondered if there was someone almighty above them, controlling everything that their pitiful little beings did, like they were puppets.

_Brother and sister as puppets?_ He didn't like the thought. His brother and sister were often oblivious to his presence, yes, but they didn't deserve to be puppets. _Mother and father as puppets, on the other hand…._

He stared down into his bowl of space clam, watching the watery substance jiggle with the movements of everyone else at the table. His face reflected in it and he imagined seeing his father and mother with strings on their arms, pulling them to carry out his every whim.

Because he was thinking about this, he didn't touch his food again after that. No one seemed to notice anyway.

Everyone else finished eating. His mother began clearing the table. She neared her husband's bowl. He held it up to her, his eyes still on his newspaper. Suddenly, the bowl, still filled with space clam, fell from his hands and shattered on the floor. Oozing clam and shell bits mixed with water drooled everywhere.

"Oops," he said. There was an empty sound that the tone his voice gave. "Seems I dropped it."

His mother's brow twitched for a moment, and he wondered if she would glare at the man. But she didn't. She didn't say anything, simply walked past him, ignoring the man and his actions. Kululu and his siblings began to leave the room, but they waited at the edge of the doorway to see if she would clean up the spill. She didn't.

By this time Kululu's brother and sister had already walked off, bored, but he stayed behind to watch.

"You're treating the kids all wrong," said his father finally. He turned a page of his newspaper. "But that's to be expected… of someone of your liking."

Now she really did glare at him. "W-well, I don't see you doing any better!"

"They're fine on their own. Let them do things for themselves once in a while, instead of hovering constantly over them." He gave her a cold glance. "It's annoying. To all of us."

_Hovering constantly over them?_ Kululu repeated in his mind. She didn't do that for him. Most of the time she even forgot he was there. Which was a good thing, but… sometimes he wasn't so sure of what he wanted from his mother.

"W-well…." His mother searched for something to say. "You're nothing to the kids! Nothing at all. Nothing to them, and nothing to me! You understand?" She waved a dishtowel in his face. "Just wake up and see that already!"

A small rage boiled up inside Kululu. This woman was nuts. Why couldn't they just leave each other and then this whole thing would be done with?

"Oh, but waking up is such a bother when you're in the house…."

"Ooooh!" His mother breathed in through her teeth, clenching her fists at her sides. "Sometimes I just wish you were gone."

"Well, good." He turned another page. "Often I wish the same thing."

That was it. He just couldn't take it anymore. Kululu walked into the room, angry at both of them.

"You both are complete morons!" he blurted. "Grow up already. You're acting like children!"

They both looked at him in awe of his outburst.

"If you hate each other, then at least be more mature about it. You're making me sorry that brother and sister still have to put up with this every day." He grinned, enjoying their expressions. "I even wonder why _I_ still put up with it."

Both parents were speechless. Kululu was satisfied, and proud of himself for speaking up.

But he knew, somewhere inside of him, that this was all just a dream, a recording of events he'd stored deep in his mind. He knew that wasn't actually what he had said. Because in reality, he just stood there watching and said nothing.

Nothing at all.


	13. Common Sense

Fuyuki was running harder than he'd ever run before. Every nerve in his body was exploding, pushing him forward and telling him to run, run, run! The Island Beast was only a few feet behind him and he had to run for his life unless he wanted to be eaten, just like his sister.

_Sis…._ For a deadly moment he began to slow down, the memory of her death flashing through his mind. _But, no! I can't stop running!_ Fuyuki picked up the pace again, running faster and faster, farther and farther, until he ran smack into a building.

He wobbled away from the surface and blinked his eyes a few times. The third time his eyes opened, it was no longer a building, but a tree.

"Whoa! Holy crud how did that even _get_ there—"

Fuyuki paused, looking at everything around the tree. He was back on the island.

He scratched his head, dumbfounded. Was it all just a dream, then? Was his sister not dead after all? That must mean also that the Island Beast was no longer chasing him, either….

Fuyuki turned around. Bad idea. The Island Beast was still there.

He yelled and ran forward, dodging the claws of the Beast as it swatted at him. It was a lot harder to run on the island, since there was so much to trip over. He had to jump over so many logs, and fallen branches, and bushes. The Island Beast was so close behind him, so ready to eat him in one bite. He just wanted to get away from it.

_Please, whatever happens, just don't let it eat me…_ he wished, squeezing his eyes shut tight as he ran. This also proved to be a bad idea, because he had run into another tree. Fuyuki pried himself away from the bark and ran past it, tearing through the forest at the maximum speed a Fuyuki could go, hoping that eventually he would loose the trail of the Beast.

In the corner of his eye, he spotted the perfect getaway—a cave! Fuyuki darted inside it, panting with exhaustion as he pressed his back up against the dark cave walls. He peered out through his left eye into the light forest. He could hear the Beast wandering around amongst the trees. Fuyuki's heart leapt up to his throat in his fright. The Beast's leg brushed up against the edge of the cave opening, its dark matted fur flying everywhere in Fuyuki's face. After that, it passed him, and Fuyuki didn't see the beast again.

_Phew_. He was finally able to let out his breath. It was the Island Beast that had torn up that rabbit he saw earlier, and that lizard, too. He wouldn't let himself become what they had—he had to return home before that happened.

Feeling that the coast was clear and now all was safe, Fuyuki poked his head out. When there was no sign of the Beast, he climbed out from the cave and brushed himself off. Fur and bits of tree bark flew off of his clothes and skin. Beetles began squirming off of him as well.

"Augh!" Fuyuki screamed, his arms twitching violently. Beetles flew everywhere when he made this motion. He began flicking them off like crazy, dancing with fright until no beetle could be found on his body. In his mind, he could still feel the little twitching of their legs. Fuyuki shuddered. By this point he just wanted to crawl into a hole and hide for the rest of his life. Except… that hole would probably be filled with beetles, too.

Fuyuki continued walking until he came upon a small clearing in the forest, one with a pond in the center of it. He sat at the edge, on a spot where it seemed that someone had already arranged leaves for someone to sit on, and bent over the water, gazing at his reflection.

"Who are you?" he asked his reflection.

"I am you," said the boy in the water. "And also, I am not."

Fuyuki lowered his eyebrows. "If you are not me, but you are also, then what are you?"

"I am common sense," he said. A leaf fell onto the pond, and gentle ripples traveled through his image. "I am what tells you what's to be done and what's not to be done. I'm the light in the darkness. I am the one who separates the right from the wrong, the possible from the impossible, and the truth from the lie."

Fuyuki lay down on his belly, supporting his jaw in his hands as he listened to the reflection beneath him.

"Why do you look like me?" he asked.

"I look like you because your mind is my home," said the boy in the water. "You have common sense like no one else does. You have been through quite a bit, though you may not know it. But all your experiences help you to have a special kind of knowledge which no one else has."

"And what is that?" Fuyuki inquired.

"Ask me later and I'll tell you," he said. His eyes closed. "Right now I'm listening to the sound of nonsense."

"What's the sound of nonsense?"

The boy in the water waited a moment, inhaling deeply through his nose. Then he opened his eyes again.

"The sound of nonsense is the opposite of the sound of common sense. I am the sound of common sense. I am what tells you to do something or to not."

Fuyuki furrowed his brow slightly, doubting these words. "But… if I was hearing voices then I wouldn't think I had common sense…."

"Good. Then that is just another way to prove why you are able to listen to me." The reflection looked up at him. "Listen closely. What do you hear when I am not speaking?"

Fuyuki paused. He listened.

"I hear nothing."

"That's right," said the boy in the water. "Nothing. Nothing is us. Likewise, we both know that nothing is what comes from everything. No matter how much we do, no matter how much we put into our lives, it will all end in nothing. We will never make a mark on the universe."

"It's all for nothing?" he asked, having neither will nor energy to ignore the other boy.

"It's all for nothing," the boy in the water repeated. The water covering him glimmered with the soft, gooey refraction of the sun high above them. In Fuyuki's eyes, he seemed like just a piece of paper smothered in blue. But in his ears and in his mind he knew better than that. "You can go as far as you can into the deepest trench of the sea, and it will be a lot for you, but to the universe it won't change a thing."

Fuyuki thought about this, gripping the words in the hopes that he might understand them. The clouds overhead passed quickly over the sun, dimming the colors of the clearing somewhat, and then it brightened again. His eyelids began to droop.

"But what I find most interesting, Fuyuki," said the boy in the water, "is that you are able to hear me, even when you are…"

Fuyuki had inexplicably fallen asleep before he could hear the last words.

* * *

He squatted, giving the little creature an examination with his eyes, and poked it gently with his finger. The wuruburu quivered at his touch.

Kululu gave a tiny giggle, which sounded more like some sort of demented laugh, and lifted the round fuzzball with the elongated tail into his arms. "You're going to be my new friend," he told the little animal.

That day Kululu carried the little creature home on his way back from school, making careful sure that no one in his family would see him bringing in any sort of animal. Even if they saw him, they probably wouldn't notice anyway, but he still wanted to take precaution. After all, this was his new friend. Kululu didn't want anyone to take it away from him.

He sprinted away into his room, where he shut the door tight and quickly, set his pet on his desk, and hacked the door's motion sensor so no one else could come in. He fell against it, sliding to the ground in a sitting position. The wuruburu hopped off the desk and waddled to him.

"We're all alone, now," said Kululu, stroking the wuruburu gently across its spine.

He picked up the tiny creature and set it back on the desk, rearranging the things on it so that it was cleared. He opened his closet door and began digging through it. As he did so, he spoke to the creature.

"Now usually, when I find an animal I take it and experiment on it." A shiver went up the wuruburu. Unable to understand Keronese as it may have been, the meaning of the implications of these words were unmistakable. "However, with you," said Kululu, stepping out of his closet with a glass cage in hands, "I won't do so."

He set the glass cage on his desk and decoded the lock so that the mechanism opened. The wuruburu was lifted into the air as he placed it within and shut the lid. Once inside, he leaned his cheek against the table, gazing at it happily.

"You have no idea how hard it is to actually find someone who will listen to me," he said to it with a sigh. "Everybody at school hates me, and I'm not sure why. Brother and sister say it's because I'm smarter than them, and so they don't like me. But I know better." The glared at nothing in particular. "Brother and sister know better, too. Ever since I was put in level seven with them, I'm not their brother anymore. I'm just… just…. I don't know."

Kululu sighed again. He glanced up at the wuruburu, who was licking its long, thin tail with the large and bony exoskeletal part of its body poking out at the end. "I'm just glad that you don't hate me. Even though technically you might think that I've imprisoned you. But you don't hate me for that, right?" He sat up in his chair, placing his hands on either side of the tank. "Right? It's a scary world out there. People are evil!" He leaned his eye closer toward it. "If I hadn't come to save you, who knows what someone else might've done."

The wuruburu whimpered under his threatening stare. Kululu leaned back in his chair.

"Oh, I understand. You want to be left alone, don't you? That's okay. Sometimes I like being alone too." He became quieter. "And sometimes I don't…."

The wuruburu clawed on the glass, aching to get out.

"Okay, okay. I'll leave. Just don't _you_ leave, all right?" said Kululu. He un-hacked the motion sensor of the door and slipped out of the room, but not before waving to the tiny wuruburu with a cheerful smile.

Over the next few days, Kululu took very good care of the little creature, making sure that it had the right amount of food and water. He gave it all of its necessities, sometimes playing with it too when he was bored. He was happy to have the little creature with him. It was his new playmate, his new friend.

Unlike the last friend that he had… the one that only lasted a day because of his fear of Kululu's strange, creepy habits….

But Kululu didn't like to think about that. That kid had issues of his own, anyway.

One day, however, he caught his wuruburu slipping out of its tank. He wasn't angry at first, since it usually did this and then played around the room, but this time he saw it move to the window and try to claw it open.

Kululu filled with sadness. "You want to…. You want to _leave_?" He went to the small animal and picked it up in his hands. "No, no, no! You can't leave! You're supposed to stay with _me_!"

The wuruburu looked into his eyes, but didn't seem to understand.

"If you leave me, then who will be my friend? …Don't leave me," he said in a lonely child's voice, his lower lip quivering.

Suddenly, his whole expression changed. His lips peeled into a grin, and the upper half of his face was concealed with shadow.

"Do you know what's going to happen if you leave me?"

The wuruburu didn't know, but Kululu was considerate enough to give him a full demonstration. He carried the animal over to the other side of his room, where he placed it on his experimentation table and strapped it down by its paws so that it was lying on its back.

"_Kuuu, ku, ku ku, ku, ku, ku._"

Out from a hidden compartment, Kululu slipped out a scalpel, which he pressed down deeply onto the wuruburu's chest and dragged down to its lower abdomen, making a single, fine incision. The wuruburu's squeals of terror were now prominently ringing throughout the room, while its internal organs began slowly oozing out. After a little while it stopped screaming. But Kululu didn't care. He just continued his punishment game until he was satisfied.

About half an hour passed until the boy came back to his senses, and after doing so, he carefully slipped the scalpel back into its compartment and went back to his desk. Slowly, he sat down in the chair. Then he started banging his head furiously against the desk.

"Why does this always happen!" he asked himself, still banging. "Why! Why! Why!"

He banged his head a few more times, then, once deciding that the poor desk had had enough, he stopped. Kululu let out a sigh, and walked to the experimentation table. He lifted up the dead animal.

"I'm sorry," he told it. "I'm sorry that I did this to you. You probably don't forgive me though. Frankly, I don't forgive myself either. It's just something that usually happens."

Walking across the room, he used his other hand to attempt to cover the top of the animal, which didn't quite work, but he felt reassured at this action of his.

Kululu went back to his closet and opened it up, in which laid the remains of his other animal friends within, and he tucked the lifeless wuruburu along with it.

_I'm sorry,_ he mouthed, one last time, before he shut the door.

But he wasn't really sorry. He didn't think he could be.

* * *

**Don't try that at home, kids. Animal abuse is bad.**


	14. Torture's End

**Oh geez! Wow. I'm sorry. I meant to update yesterday, and so I uploaded this chapter to the document manager, but I never actually posted it... Anyway, here's the chapter.**

* * *

Fuyuki was lost.

He didn't know where he was, nor how he'd gotten there, but he knew that it wasn't where he once was and that it wasn't where he was supposed to be.

All around him was a black void with tiny star structures sprinkled throughout it, a never-ending depth. Fuyuki stuck his hand into the blackness, but the blackness was all around him. He couldn't tell where his hair ended and where the void began.

He was on a road. More specifically, a path. Flat, floating stones were tiled out in front of him, delineating a lane for him to walk on that stretched all the way into the end of space. He didn't know if he should walk it. Where would it lead to? What would it do? What would become of him?

Nonetheless, he began walking, not knowing where he would end up. Curiosity had gotten the better of him.

He walked for a long time. He really wasn't so sure of how much time had passed with him walking. He began running now, searching desperately for the end of that road, the light at the end of the tunnel, the _something_ that told him what all of this would be for in the end.

Yet all he got was nothing.

He slowed down. He didn't want to walk anymore; nothing became of it. It was only when he stopped walking when he finally saw the end. But when he started walking again, the end vanished, and only more road appeared.

Fuyuki forced his feet to stay where they were. The end of the tunnel was peeking itself into view now, slowly coming toward him. He could see it now. He could see what the end of the tunnel was.

In a faded circle of light, he could see the inside of a room. His eyes widened, realizing who was in that room. It was in the dining room of his own house. There was his mother, Natsumi and him, both appearing younger… and his father.

"Dad!" he yelled. Fuyuki began running again. He stuck his hands inside the room, but it wasn't actually there. It was as if it was just a holograph in the air, and he realized this when his hands reached the other side. He could see them faintly, wiggling his fingers, as if he'd only stuck his hands into water.

Fuyuki took his hands out and swatted the image of his family, sending ripples through it, as if it really had been water all along. He was angry. He had wanted it to be real. He wanted to return to those good times, when his father had still been there. He wanted to remember what his face looked like.

The image of his family had now completely vanished, and instead he felt two hands placed on his shoulders. He didn't turn around to see who it was. He already knew.

"Hello, son," said his father from behind.

"Dad…." Fuyuki's eyes glistened with water. "Why did you leave?"

His dad breathed out a sigh. "I don't believe that I can tell you that."

"Why not?" Fuyuki yelled. "You leave for years, and yet you won't even tell me the reason for it?"

The man shook his head, though Fuyuki couldn't see this gesture.

Through a strained voice, Fuyuki pleaded, "Will you at least tell me where you are…?"

"I'm right behind you, Fuyuki," said his father. "I've always been. But you've never believed me when I said that. You always thought I was joking."

Fuyuki listened to this, thinking back to what he meant. He started to remember. Back when their father was actually there with them, Fuyuki had always gotten so emotional whenever he had to leave for work. Young as he was, sometimes he didn't understand why his father had to go. Whenever he came home, he would always ask, "Daddy, where were you?" and his father always responded, "I was right behind you, Fuyuki, smiling while you played."

"But one day you left." Fuyuki swallowed, forcing down the tears in his throat. "You left and you _didn't_ come back! You weren't behind me at all!"

"You're right, Fuyuki," said his father. He could feel his hands tighten on his shoulders. "Right now I will tell you why it was that I left. Do you want to know?"

"Yes, I do want to know." His voice sounded fluttery now, like a feather, but what it really was was unstable. He swallowed again.

"The reason…."

"Yes?"

"The reason was because of you. You misbehaved all the time, Fuyuki. You were hectic, and loud, and whiny. It was too much for me to handle. So one day—"

He didn't want to hear it.

"—I just couldn't take it anymore, and I packed up and left."

"No! That can't be true!" Fuyuki yelled. He covered the sides of his forehead with his hands, as if to block out the sounds in his mind. "You wouldn't do that! Fathers are supposed to care about their children…. Even if I was all that you said, you wouldn't have cared! I was still your son, and that's all that matters!"

"No." His hands tightened again. "That's not all that matters."

"_NO!_" Fuyuki screamed. He thrashed about under his father's grip, finally loosening it enough to be able to turn around, infuriated at the man who claimed to be his father. But when he saw the man's face, he realized that it wasn't. It wasn't his father.

"You… are…." He was speechless.

"Yes, that's right, Fuyuki," said the man with his same face. "I am you."

"No! Not again!" Fuyuki protested.

"Yes. It is true."

"You can't be me!"

"Oh, but I am." His other face gave him a smile. "I am fear, Fuyuki. All that you fear is within me."

Fuyuki began backing away. Oddly he felt fear in seeing this new being. He didn't want to fear being afraid. He wasn't afraid of having fears. But something about this person gave him an unsettling feeling.

Maybe it was because, two seconds later, the man with his face morphed into a gigantic beetle that was slowly advancing on him.

Fuyuki shrieked in terror and began running away. The road stretched out before him again. It was such a long way to run. Would he make it?

He continued running, desperately trying to escape the beetle that was furiously chasing him, and huffing and panting as he did so. He needed to get away from the beetle. But he just wanted it to end, too. He didn't want it to chase him anymore.

_That's right…_ thought Fuyuki in his mind. He had just been running from the Island Beast a while ago. He was tired of running from things. Running wasn't the task for him, anyway. And even if it was a beetle, a _horrible, horrible_ beetle… maybe he didn't have to be running so much from it.

Fuyuki slowed to a halt. The beetle was now poking its spiny legs along his neck and back. The road in front of him disappeared, and in its place the island beach materialized. Fuyuki stepped on to the beach, abandoning the beetle behind him.

He couldn't believe it. He had really done it—he'd escaped the beetle once and for all. He had defeated fear.

* * *

Kululu couldn't wake up, no matter how hard he tried. Everything that he did just seemed to make it worse.

Nightmares were constantly attacking his mind. Most of them were memories, simple recordings of things that had happened to him as a child, or in his early years in the military. Sometimes they were things that hadn't even happened, fears that he had, or worries that he kept secretly stuffed down, for the worst fear of all was knowing that he was afraid of something and that in itself could potentially be used against him.

Most of the dreams he had involved him as a child. They ranged from bad memories to horrible experiences. Being alone on the training school playground. Watching as his siblings ran off together and had fun. Constantly having to listen to his parents arguing. Having his mom tell him that he couldn't handle doing something, because he was always too young for it. School bullies picking on him when he'd been skipped ahead. Not being able to make friends.

The ones that were just plain nightmares were the worst. He tried to assure himself that they were just dreams, that he couldn't be hurt, but sometimes even he wasn't certain, and those assurances were long forgotten in the midst of his nightmares. He sometimes dreamed that Tororo found out everything about him and looked down upon him the rest of his life. He dreamed that, because the invasion of Pekopon was failing so much, they were sent off to be executed. Or that he was suffocating underwater, and he couldn't resurface because someone put a net over him. He dreamed that the people he actually did care about starting hating him and they turned their backs, and then he accidentally killed them in his anger.

He tossed and turned in his sleep, desperately trying to break free from the chains that were encasing him in their nightmarish lands.

Mercifully, out of nowhere Kululu bolted upright, panting heavily. Beads of sweat trickled all over him. He felt awful, but he'd finally woken up.

_What's going on?_ he wondered. His eyes scanned the beach around him. Somehow, he was back on the island. But why was there a pile of sand on top of him?

Kululu pushed all the sand off and then stood up. His legs gave way and his hands hit the sandy ground. He was shaking all over. _What's happening to me?_ he thought.

He didn't remember anything other than the dreams. No—wait—he remembered his conversation with Fuyuki the night before. The night before…. How long ago was that? Kululu had no idea. He didn't know how much time had passed. It might as well have been days that he'd been asleep. Why was he sleeping for so long? he thought. He knew he'd been dreaming for quite a while. All those nightmares…. A shudder ran through him.

Kululu forced himself to stand again. His legs were wobbly as hell. Standing up was a bad idea. Immediately, just as he had done so, a nauseous feeling arose in him. The first place he walked to was the ocean, where he waited awhile until his stomach had completely emptied itself. _Am I sick?_ he asked himself, looking down at the water as if to see his reflection. But that was kind of hard to do in the ocean, where the waves are crashing wildly. All he saw was foamy sea spray and some starfish. _Ugh… I look terrible!_ he thought.

Urging himself that he could do this, Kululu backed away from the ocean and got back up to his feet. Oh, no. Where was Fuyuki? If Kululu was in this condition, then…. _Crud. Fuyuki is nowhere to be found._

Kululu ran into the edge of the woods, shouting Fuyuki's name. He got no reply. He decided it would be best to perhaps look around the island for him, but that wouldn't guarantee that he would find him. Fuyuki could have just as easily drowned in the water. Kululu was desperate to find him, and yet… suddenly he just felt so… tired, and weak.

Kululu sat down on the leaves, resting his head against the trunk of a tree. Maybe… Fuyuki wouldn't mind if he waited… just a little while.

* * *

Fever-dreaming. He was a kid again, in some enclosed room. Everything went from cold to warm, and the colors shifted in and out. He wasn't so tired anymore. He wanted to awaken. He wanted to get out of this place.

Kululu was in his room. His experimentation table was in front of it, filled with different assortments of objects and doohickeys that he was assembling into different inventions. They were wonderful. He was so proud of them.

"Look at this, mom!" He held them up for the woman standing next to him to see.

She nodded, turning away from him slightly. "That's nice, Kulu-chan." There were other things more important to do.

"Fine, I'll show dad instead," he told himself. He went to his father who was in the story below them. His father wasn't paying attention either. He was reading something on an electronic screen in front of him.

"Dad, do you want to see what I made?" asked Kululu, holding it behind him excitedly.

"Not right now, son."

"But—"

"Can't you see I'm busy right now? Ugh… why don't you go outside and play ball with your brother and sister or something?"

"But I don't want t—"

"No buts, Kululu. You need to get out more. You need to be more physically prepared for the world. As my son you should know that. Now stop with your silly arts and crafts and…."

The room faded into something else. He was outside now, pressed against the outside walls of a large building. It was his school.

An older Keronian held him up by his backpack from behind, and there were others all surrounding Kululu. The one in front of him had his hand balled into a fist.

Kululu squeezed his eyes shut. He knew what was coming.

When he was finally able to open his eyes, the Keronian in front of him was looking him menacingly in the eye.

"What are you going to do about it? Tell on us?"

The other kids around him snickered.

"Why are you doing this to me? What satisfaction do you find in the physical pain of someone younger than you?"

"Ppfft… there goes the baby again, talking like he's so much smarter than us!"

They only laughed at him. Kululu laughed at them on the inside too, knowing that they were only idiots. They caught the hint in his expression.

"Oh, so you think we're funny, huh?" They looked angry. "I bet Rinono and Shupepe think that too, don't they?"

Kululu glanced at the twin Keronians standing behind the people around him. He cast his eyes to the ground. Suddenly it wasn't so funny anymore.

"You're horrible to them, Baby. You're horrible to all of us."

As the next punch was swung at him, everything changed again.

His parents were fighting again. Bicker, bicker, bicker, blah, blah, blah. Kululu sat on a chair, listening to them. They knew that he was there. They must have forgotten, because they were too busy yelling at each other instead.

He was trying to focus on his new invention. But they just wouldn't shut up. It was so annoying. When he was a lot younger, all he'd wanted was for them to be able to get along. But then he learned that that was impossible, and soon he changed his wish. He just wanted them to shut up for a while and let him have peace.

He knew why they couldn't get along. They disagreed on so many things. They had nothing in common anymore. He didn't even think they loved each other anymore. One time Kululu had seen his father linking arms with a different woman, someone purple. She was the one whose sons must have surely been better than Kululu. They were strong and athletically talented. They didn't invent things all day and play on their computers. They were the better children.

But nothing could be done about the bickering of his parents. Shouting, screaming, yelling, arguing. He just wanted it to stop. He wanted it all to stop. _Please…._

No more bickering. Now there was silence. Now Kululu was playing with animals again, finding them, trapping them, befriending them, and killing them.

"You don't get to be my friend," said a Keronian child, somewhat around his own age. "You're scary. I don't like you."

The older kids still hated him, too.

"I thought about sticking up for you a few times, but then somebody told me that you wanted my sister to die," said one of them, the one that Kululu had wanted to be friends with.

Everyone was walking away from them. Kululu was surrounded by a circle was emptiness. There was no one for him. They all were leaving. They all had more important things to do. He felt so lonely.

Changing again. In that hidden park. The girl was there, his only friend. Never wanted to hurt her. He tried to run for her, reaching out. He could only see her from behind. Slowly she turned around. She had no eyes.

"You only imagined it," said the girl, vanishing toward the sky.

His house. He was in his house again. There was darkness. No sounds came from anything. No sounds, even when he tried to speak. His hands were shaking. He was smiling. There were butterflies. Lovely orange and yellow butterflies, flying toward the ceiling.

The closet. His hands went to the closet. His animal friends were there. So were his parents. They were quiet now. They wouldn't ever argue again. Now he had peace.

Brother and sister were crying. They didn't know where mom and dad were. it's okay, Kululu told them. it's okay brother and sister. it's okay because mom and dad aren't fighting anymore. you can play with me now

Changing again. Hands on the controls of the tank. He blasted through it all. ending it, ending the hate. no more hate, no more no more you cant hurt me now he shouted joyously. you cant hurt me now not at all.

Suddenly his school was run through. It was in the papers, the news, the everything. Of the horrible child who destroyed his school. Why would anyone ever do that. Why, why, why, why. There were such nice people in that school. So many innocent lives.

So much to never regret, he didn't regret anything, not at all. of course the memories were a bit fuzzy too and he wasnt quite sure where or not there was any

* * *

Kululu woke up again. His heart was beating rapidly. The effects of the nightmare were still dancing around in his mind. He gripped his head, waiting it out until it dripped away.

But it was over now. Everything was okay. Nothing to be afraid of anymore.


	15. Recovery

**In response to what many of you may have been wondering about in the previous chapter, I will tell you that fanfictions are never a reliable source of information when it comes to canons.**

**And yet, I still find myself wondering about Tamama's parents, too... Does that kid even have any family?**

* * *

Kululu's whole body ached. He felt as though he'd just gone through a meat grinder and came back out with no change.

Despite the pain that wracked his being, he knew that he had to do something to find Fuyuki, whom he still didn't see on the beach. Wherever the boy was, Kululu knew that he needed help. He wasn't in such a great condition himself, so Fuyuki must not have been, either.

He knew that he wasn't in the best state for walking, but now was no time to complain. Kululu forced himself onto his feet. Grabbing a walking stick for good measure, he ventured off to find Fuyuki, and bring him back to the beach in safety.

* * *

Fuyuki lay on his back against the leaves of the forest, staring up through the tees at the bright sky. The clouds were forming such interesting shapes. In many of them he saw blobs. Blobs were very rare to see when clouds formed.

He was a sitting duck, and he felt like a big pile of berries, drying out in the sunlight. That was what it was like. Drying out, letting himself rot, tired, weak, and horrible. He wanted to groan, to scream, to shout, to tear at something or someone until all the fight in him completely vanished. But his mind was going slower than the rest of the world was. Everything was in slow-motion. It was such a temptation to just lie down and sleep, something he'd ached to do for so, so very long….

And so he fell asleep. Just as he had done so, he felt his body being dragged across the leaves, to somewhere that wasn't as bright. The light dimmed over his eyes. Then it went bright again. Then it dimmed. It kept switching, till at last, the shade through his eyelids was a glowing, stinging red.

He didn't know what was happening. All he could do was sleep, and wait for the pain to subside.

* * *

When he finally came to, Fuyuki found himself on the beach, laying by a warm fire. Glorious fire. He felt as if he was freezing. Turning his head slightly to the side, he saw Kululu beside him.

Kululu was awake! How had he gotten there? Fuyuki tried to sit up, but a stabbing pain went through his body. Kululu placed a hand on his chest and gently nudged him back down.

Before he could say anything else, Kululu pushed forward half a coconut husk, full of freshwater, to Fuyuki's lips. He didn't question this, and instead drank thirstily and thankfully.

He downed the drink and took a breath. He was about to thank him when a nauseous feeling bubbled up inside him. Kululu allowed him to stop a while to do the same thing he had, just a few minutes ago, in the ocean waters.

"Augh…" Fuyuki groaned. A small trail of saliva still dripped from his parched mouth. He wiped it away, and a headache attacked him.

Kululu made him sit back down on the bunch of leaves on the sand he'd previously been laying on. After the boy did so, he handed him a stick with some sort of food on it. Fuyuki didn't pay attention to what it was; he just ate. Not such a problem at the moment, but earlier it could've been vital….

"What happened?" Fuyuki asked. His voice sounded cracked and strange, like it wasn't his own anymore. He rubbed his temples briefly. "I feel like I've just went on some long journey…. But suddenly my head really hurts."

"Yeah." Kululu poked a stick at the fire, making it sizzle. He had his knees up by his chest. He must've already finished his own share of food and left the rest for Fuyuki, because there were more parts of it hanging over the fire. "We were both kind of out for about two and a half days, if I'm right. Just checked the signal fire up there on the mountain, and that's what it seems to be."

Fuyuki turned toward the signal fire, which was up and going. It must have taken Kululu a lot to have ignited it again, if Kululu was as weak as he, which he looked like he was.

"Oh. And, uh… th-thanks for helping me," he said. He scratched his head. "Was I asleep on the beach? I don't remember falling asleep on the beach."

"That's because you didn't." Kululu glanced briefly at the trees. "I found you somewhere in the forest. You seemed to be asleep, but… I dunno. Your eyes were half open."

At that moment Fuyuki caught the full effects of not having eaten for two and a half days. His body screamed for food. But his stomach said no. The thought of food nauseated him, but he knew he must eat, even if he might vomit it up later.

He furrowed his brow. "What was I doing? I mean, since you found me in the forest and all. But how did I get there?"

Kululu shrugged. "I think we were both pretty loopy. And nauseas. Might've been the rabbit we ate, like it wasn't cooked well enough or something…." He seemed to be talking more to himself now. "But no, that was fresh…. Fresh meat shouldn't have any diseases on it…."

Fuyuki paled suddenly. He looked down at the food in his hands. It was rabbit meat. His mind flashed back to when he first explored the island. There had been that tree with the mushrooms around it… and he had stupidly gathered them to eat a few nights ago for them to eat.

"Oh, no!" he cried, turning to Kululu. "I'm so sorry, Sergeant Major! This was all my fault…. Do you remember eating mushrooms a few nights ago?"

Kululu thought back. He slowly nodded.

"Oh… that would probably explain it, then. I felt the effects of the mushrooms much sooner than you had, and also overcame them sooner, because of my smaller body. Ku ku. Whereas, with you, it was much slower." Strangely, he wasn't angry. "Guess this is both our faults, then, because neither of us seemed to notice."

"So… you're not mad at me?"

"Nope. Ku-ku. I'll just hold it against you later!"

"Awwww…."

Kululu laughed cynically at his pain.

Fuyuki recalled something. "So, if we were both sick from the mushrooms… then everything I saw wasn't real?"

"Ku ku ku. Nope."

"Ah! I knew it!" He smacked his palm into his fist. "A bit disappointing, though…. I had thought for sure that I was seeing some rare, mysterious paranormal phenomenon. You know, like one of those once-in-a-lifetime-experience kind of things."

"Eh? What did you see?"

"It was pretty weird…. I think I might have been hallucinating. I saw the Sarge and my sister. And then my father's voice, too, but it turned out that he was actually just me."

"Uh…?"

"And my reflection was talking to me, too. There were lots of beetles…. Oh! And I saw the beast on this island."

"That… doesn't… sound so healthy," Kululu noted. "Are you sure you're _still_ not sick?"

"Nope, not at all. I still feel terrible."

"I see…. Thought so." He nodded to himself, still looking a bit concerned. "What about this 'island beast' you keep mentioning?"

Fuyuki leaned down on his side, supporting himself with his elbow on the ground. "Oh, I don't actually know if it's real or not. I kind of thought it would be pretty cool."

He swallowed the last bit of rabbit meat. Kululu handed him another portion, which he accepted gratefully. It was only now that felt the hunger kicking in.

"I don't know what animal it was that did it—" Fuyuki swallowed a bit of the meant before he went on. "—but a few days back… I think this was the day you'd gotten caught in the sand pit?… anyway, in the middle of the forest there was this dead rabbit. It looked like its stomach had been cut open."

Kululu stared at him silently a moment as Fuyuki continued.

"And then, a little ways off, I found a lizard in the same state, hanging from a branch by its tail."

"Oh… um…" Kululu suddenly became interested in the fire in front of them. "That does sound… like… a pretty bad thing…. You don't sound too bothered by it," he noticed.

Fuyuki thrust his food triumphantly in the air. "That's because I wanna see the animal that did it! There must be some amazing evolution on this island for the thing to have been able to pick up animals and put them on branches."

Kululu cleared his throat. "And… hypothetically… what if it _wasn't_ some beast on the island?"

Fuyuki bit back into his food. "Well, then I would wonder why it is that they can kill rabbits so easily when we're scrambling to get food for ourselves."

Kululu stared uneasily at his feet.

As he nibbled, a thought struck him. "Hey, Sergeant Major, where'd you get this rabbit? 'Cause I know that we didn't put the rabbit trap back up…."

"Uh…."

Fuyuki looked mildly disgusted now. "Wait… you didn't… take the dead one from the forest… did you?"

"What? Ew. No, ku ku ku. That's been dead for days. This is a fresh one."

"Oh… uh… how'd you get it, then?"

"Would you believe me if I said that it was just a piece of fruit that looks like a rabbit to you because you're sick and delusional right now?"

"Probably. I mean, no."

"Eh… thought so." Kululu rested his chin in his hands, gazing into the flames before them.

"Sergeant Major?"

"Yeah?"

"When do you think we'll get off this island?"

He sighed. "Soon, I hope. I've had enough with this place." He clenched his hands into fists. "Hell, I had enough when we first arrived. Ku ku ku."

After that they ate in silence for a while, a peaceful silence, while the fire crackled between them. Some birds chirped their evening songs deep in the trees, which stood together to form looming shadows across the beach.

"…Sergeant Major?"

"What."

"When I was… sick… in the forest, what were you doing?"

Kululu shrugged, sitting back up. "Sleeping, mostly."

"Did you dream anything?"

"Usually just fever-dreams, ku ku."

"Fever-dreams about what?"

"Are fever-dreams even about anything, most of the time?"

"Sometimes they are."

"Well, these ones weren't. They were just pretty random." He looked off to the side. "I'm just glad they're over finally, and I don't have to deal with them anymore…."

"Well, I don't know about you, but I don't feel much better. What if we're still sick? The same thing might happen again." Fuyuki's eyes flitted everywhere anxiously. "M-maybe you'll be the one to start seeing things, and I'll be in a comatose state of nightmare. Maybe the next time we crack like that, we won't be able to stop. Maybe will never be the same afterward, and then—"

"You're letting your imagination get the better of you."

"Oh." Fuyuki let himself relax. "Sorry." His head fell against the leaves beneath him. "I just… I just can't believe I let us eat those mushrooms. I'm sorry."

Kululu gave another shrug. "Can't do anything about it now. Just have to wait until the rest of it gets out of our system."

He felt a bit guilty, knowing that he'd be cured before Fuyuki would, since he had a much smaller body.

"But look… if anything else happens, at least we'll both be here to stop it, right?"

From where he was on the ground, Fuyuki peered up at Kululu. He was staring out toward the sea, refusing to make eye contact with him. He looked as if he didn't care about whatever he said, but Fuyuki felt assured. Sometimes Kululu said things and didn't mean them, and other times, though very rarely, he said something very kind and thoughtful that was anything but a lie. Fuyuki smiled. He knew that Kululu had a good heart deep down.

Snuggling down onto the leaves, Fuyuki fell asleep, and there were no fears to stop him.


	16. Fate

**Today is my little sister's birthday :D Happy birthday, Xiao Tan! Pssh like she'll ever read this. But she's nine now. And still adorable as ever.**

**Yayz for pointless information.**

* * *

In the morning when Fuyuki had woken up, Kululu was already there, nudging the small fire before them with a stick. Leaning against the flames, on sticks of their own, were some assortments of meats. Fuyuki could only distinguish rabbit meat and fish, thought there was something else there that seemed to have scales on it. Hanging over the fire in a basket suspended by curved sticks stuck in the ground were various nuts that were roasting.

"Breakfast is ready~" Kululu crooned to him, seeing him awaken. He handed him one of the sticks, of the ones that had food on them. "Eat all you can. Dunno about you, but last night was the first time I'd eaten in two and a half days, ku ku."

Fuyuki sat up and scratched the top of his head. He let out a sleepy yawn. When they got off this island, after having a big feast of real food, the first thing he wanted to do was give his hair a nice, long combing.

He took a bite of the meat that Kululu had handed him. There was something different about the way it tasted…. Like chicken.

"What is this?" he asked Kululu.

"Ku ku ku. Food."

"Uh… what kind of food?"

"Snake! Ku ku."

"Oh… um…."

Fuyuki glanced back at it. It actually tasted pretty good. He bit into it again, spitting out the bones that he could find with his tongue. It didn't occur to him to ask Kululu where all this food kept coming from. He was just grateful to be eating again. He was so, so hungry. Not eating for two and a half days, being on a deserted island, and also being sick both in the head and in the gut wasn't a good mix for a boy his age.

"So what are we going to do today?" he asked. Fuyuki paused midsentence to swallow his… snake.

"Ku ku. Dunno. What else do we need to do on this island?"

"Hmmm…." Fuyuki thought. "I know! We could investigate the paranormal activity that we've witnessed!"

"Being…?"

"That white spirit lady. Or the Island Beast!"

Kululu almost choked on his food.

"Uh, no. Let's not."

Fuyuki looked disappointed. "Well, why not?"

"Because there are other things we have to worry about. Like actually _surviving_."

"Oh. Oh, yeah." He nibbled on the tail of his snake thoughtfully.

"I'd like to build a radio of some sort, but… we don't have any material that I might be able to use to do so. Although we do have that one part from the ship, but that's not an electronic part. It's just a contraption."

"You mean, you can't use that?"

Kululu twitched. "I can try…."

"Cool!" Fuyuki grinned. "What about the signal fire? Should we light that first?"

"Eh, no, it's already…." Kululu glanced up at the mountaintop. The signal fire was out. "Shoot… why does it keep going out on us? All right, after eating, let's go make the signal fire."

"But… what if a plane flies overhead?"

"Then they'll see that we have a fire here on the beach."

"I don't think it works that way…."

"If they're looking down, then it will."

"That sounds dangerous."

Kululu frowned. "Ku. Pekoponian pilots are so incompetent. Do you mean to tell me that they don't have any directional ultrasonic reflectors in their planes?"

"Uh… I don't really know what that is."

"Oh, right. I forgot you didn't know much about these things."

Kululu sat back. He had already finished everything he had, and now it was Fuyuki's turn. Even though Fuyuki was already full, he knew he couldn't argue. Better to eat now even when he wasn't full than go hungry later.

Once they had finished with all the food, Kululu and Fuyuki put out the fire. They wouldn't need it anymore, now that there was nothing roasting on it. The two of them headed up the mountain side, traveling their way through the dense underbrush until it was high enough up that the forestage began to clear out. It wasn't a very tall mountain. Just their luck; Fuyuki and Kululu probably wouldn't be able to handle anything larger and more demanding of legwork.

"Here we go," said Fuyuki.

He took out the pair of fire-starting glasses from his pocket and angled it toward the pile of logs and ashes. The sun caught on the lens and a small pillar of smoke arose from the middle. Fuyuki blew on it slightly, urging for it to grow bigger. Soon a tiny flame appeared, dancing up through the air like an expanding feather of orange and yellow.

Fuyuki blew the glasses off, shaking his hand to get the minimal amount of heat off. "There we go," he said, smiling at the fire.

"Now I should probably get to work on finding things to make a radio… and you can…." He scratched his cheek. "…go… search for… things?"

"Like paranormal activity? Yeah!" Fuyuki thrust his hands in the air.

Kululu looked up at him. Then he frowned, and thrust his hands at Fuyuki, pushing him slightly.

"Dammit, Fuyuki! You lost the glasses!"

"I… did…?" Fuyuki lowered his hands and looked at his palms.

It was true. there were no glasses in them.

"No, but—I—I swear! I had them the whole time! Really, Sergeant Major!"

"No, no, _no!_ You can't do that! I don't have any other glasses left." He touched his face. "Besides these ones…. And I need these ones to see."

"I thought you had, like, a hundred pairs, though!"

"No. No, I don't."

"Um, what if we just learn to make a fire the normal way?"

Kululu gave him a look. "Do _you_ know how to do that?"

Fuyuki shook his head. His shoulders slumped. Kululu was mad at him now, but he didn't even remember dropping the glasses.

"Wait—maybe we can still find them!"

"Fine, you go do that, then." Kululu turned his head in a half-circle around the bottom of the mountain. "You go look on that part of the mountain, and I'll search on this part," he pointed.

"All right." Fuyuki began heading downward, and Kululu separated from him to search on his own.

Fuyuki felt guilty for losing the glasses, but that wouldn't solve anything. He knew that they were somewhere on the ground. He tried to recount everything that he had done to get the glasses to be potentially dropped…. Gee, they could be anywhere on the part of the mountain that they'd been on. And really, how hard would it be to find some glass on a mountain, where the sun shone brightly on?

_Uh-oh,_ thought Fuyuki. If the glasses were on the ground, and on the mountain, where they could easily be hit by the light from the sun… if they happened to be angled just right, he might even accidentally start another fire unintentionally.

_Or are those from cigarette butts that forest fires start?_ thought Fuyuki. _Oh, well, I should still find them, or it might already be too late!_

Contrary to what Kululu probably thought, since Fuyuki saw him heading down the mountain, those glasses couldn't have gotten far. They were just a pair of glasses, so it wasn't like they could just sprout legs and walk out of his hands. And if they could… Fuyuki would be concerned for his well-being, because maybe he hadn't overcome the effects of the mushrooms, after all.

Wherever he searched on the ground, Fuyuki couldn't find them. At first he looked in a small area, in the area they'd been standing in, but it wasn't there. He expanded the area of his search, but he still couldn't find it. He looked in the fire. But it was bright, and they weren't in there, either. He began heading down the mountain. Every foothold, every shrubbery, and every vine he checked inside or behind, but those glasses weren't anywhere to be found.

He swallowed, becoming nervous. If they didn't find the glasses, then they'd have to use the ones that Kululu used to see. That would probably make him really angry. Fuyuki didn't want to see Kululu angry. He didn't have such good experiences with dealing with people who got really scary-angry, and he didn't want to have this deserted island, where he'd be alone with the guy, be his first time having to deal with something like that.

_Or… we could always just learn to make a fire the NORMAL way,_ Fuyuki reminded himself in his mind. This would probably be the best tactic, because at the rate that things were going, he probably wouldn't find those evasive glasses anyway. He went back up the mountain and took a seat by the signal fire. After finding some good sticks on the ground to use, he tried his hand at rubbing them together on a rock, so that if he did generate a fire, it wouldn't escape and devour the whole island.

It didn't work. Because lo and behold, rubbing two sticks together _didn't_ make fires.

Fuyuki sighed and tossed the sticks to the ground. Maybe Kululu could help him figure out how to do it, once he returned from wherever he was. If he wasn't still angry at him, that was. And Kululu being Kululu, Fuyuki already had a feeling that he knew the answer to that.

* * *

Kululu didn't even bother looking for the glasses. Rather, he did at first, but after a quick search he decided that they might as well have disappeared from existence. They were nowhere to be found. _Fuyuki, that idiot!_ he thought angrily.

_Should I start making a radio, then?_ he asked himself, but he didn't really feel up to it. Instead he headed to his hidden den, the one where he usually went to to get away from Fuyuki and have some peace and quiet finally.

It wasn't that far off. It was deep in the forest though, and a bit hidden, so it was always a bit tricky to get to. But once he was there, he didn't regret the walk. The water in the pond was cool and relaxing, the rocks were hot with sunlight, and the ferns and moss surrounding the place gave it a safe, enclosed feeling. It filled him up with warmth.

Warmth, that was, until a familiar chilly feeling passed over him.

Kululu quickly sat up and looked behind him. There was nothing there, but he knew what it was. He waited, boredom growing stronger and stronger, until a soft white figure slowly materialized against the yellow-green of the ferns and moss.

Kululu narrowed his eyes, taking in the image. How fitting that she would come here at such a time to bother him, when he was already irritated. But he knew just how to act to get her to leave. "What do you want?" he asked impatiently. "Why do you keep bothering me? And why here?"

The white spirit stared at him blankly, her glowing eyes seeming to stare out into space.

"Can you even talk? Or are you too stupid to do even that?"

Finally, the figure spoke.

"You don't speak to many people, do you?"

"No, I do. I just don't like to, ku ku ku." He cocked his brow at it. "So really, what do you want with me? Gonna curse me or something?" He made his hands go limp and held them up in front of his chest, imitating the ghost of the Hinata house, Omiyo.

The spirit shook her head, her floating white hair swirling around her as she did so.

"I do not curse. I am not a ghost, I am a spirit."

"Oh, so what brings you here, Madam Spirit?" Kululu lay down on his side, his elbow against the grass and propping up his head with his hand. He looked as if he didn't really care whether she was there or not. Chatting with a spirit (and deliberately irking one) was just the thing to take his mind off Fuyuki's idiocy.

The figure's expression didn't change.

"This is my island."

"Oh, my bad. Ku ku. Guess we should have just let ourselves drown when our ship was about to crash, huh?"

Satisfyingly, she glared slightly. "This is not—"

"No? You didn't want us to drown? Because we could have just as easily been swept away. It was quite a miracle that we washed up on shore, ku ku!"

Her mouth opened slightly, but she said nothing.

"Ahhhh, I get it." Kululu flopped onto his back, his arms crossed behind his head. "You're lonely, aren't you? You want us to be here on the island with you."

Her eyes narrowed. "I am not lonely."

"Oh yes you are. That look on your face is one that I've seen so many times before, ku ku ku!" He shook a finger at her. "C'mon, now, there's no reason to deny it. All o—"

The white spirit picked him up by the head. She had a freezing grip, and yet her glowing white eyes seemed to burn through him. "If you really wanted me to let you drown," said the spirit, "then all you had to do was say so."

Before Kululu could do anything to escape, the white spirit took him through the air and dragged him into the pond, where she released his grip on him, letting him drift through the cool water.

Smiling, she floated off, leaving the drowning Keronian by himself.


	17. The Lonely Spirit

Water surrounded him, a deep abyss of blue. In some spots he could see patches of light, which he tried to make himself float to, but it was for naught. Submerged, all the energy that he thought he had seemed to be gone. All he could hope to do was wait it out till he floated back to the top and was able to resurface and refill his lungs.

The water was pressing all around him; he couldn't breathe. Since what the spirit did was so unexpected, he hadn't any time to take a breath, so he was forced to make do with what little air he had. He was already running out of it, too, and before long his lungs would surely burst.

Kululu's fingers groped the emptiness of the water, reaching out into the glimmering sunlight that stretched out above him. This wasn't like the last time he was underwater. In the ocean, it was much worse; waves had been thrust at him from every angle. Here, he didn't know what to make of it. Inside the pond seemed to be in another world, separated from all sunlight by a little pane of rippling glass. Yet here he was, torn away from that sun, because he was stuck underwater.

He didn't flail his arms. He didn't try to resurface. He was already too deep in the pond by now, and he couldn't feel anything under his feet to spring off of. As he could feel all his defenses finally shutting down, he knew that it was time to give up. Maybe this would be the end.

Kululu drifted lifelessly through the water, his eyes beginning to close. It was déjà vu to him.

* * *

"…geant Major!" a voice was calling. It shouted to him again. "Sergeant Major!"

Kululu blinked, slowly adjusting his eyes to the light. He squinted them and slowly sat up. As the objects around him came into focus, Kululu realized where he was and what had transpired.

Yup. It had happened again. There was Fuyuki, and no doubt about it, he had saved Kululu's life once again.

He opened his mouth to say something, but the coughs found their way through. He couldn't control them when they came. It took a while for the fit to subside, and when he was sure that all the water was finally out of his lungs, Kululu sat back up as though nothing had happened.

"Well, well, well." Kululu let out a sigh. "So we meet again, huh, savior of mine."

"You were drowning, Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki said to him.

"Oh, really? I wasn't aware. Ku ku ku. I thought I'd just been dreaming."

Fuyuki frowned. "Very funny, Sergeant Major. You could've died!"

Kululu paused. He looked downward. "Yeah, I guess I owe it to you again for saving me… for the _third frogging time_ this trip."

Fuyuki counted something on his fingers, then his eyebrows perked in surprise.

"I guess that also means that I should probably stop being so angry at you about the glasses thing…. If we want to survive on this island, we probably have to get along more, after all." Kululu trailed off, and fidgeted with his fingers nervously.

Fuyuki understood. He nodded, giving a gentle, assuring laugh. "It's okay, Sergeant Major. I'm sorry about that too." He held out his hand. "Friends?"

Kululu glared and turned away from the hand that was outstretched to him. Fuyuki sickened him sometimes. He was so… so nice. Too nice. It was weird. There just wasn't something right about it. "We are _not_ friends."

"Aw! Why not?"

"I don't befriend people, ku ku!"

"But you're friends with Saburo…."

"Yeah, ku ku ku. We're wave buddies.~"

"And you seem to be friends with M—"

Kululu stood up. "Oh! Do you see that? I think I see it too. It looks like the glint of glasses." He rushed forward into the trees.

"Wait! Sergeant Major!"

Fuyuki followed him and pulled him back out.

"Why were you drowning, anyway? Did you just trip?"

"Yeah. I tripped. Ku ku."

"No, you didn't!"

"Why'd you asked me if I did, then? Fine. Some weird jerk pushed me in."

"But… Sergeant Major, _you're_ a weird jerk. Well… no offense or anything, but you know it, right?"

"Yeah. I know it." Kululu adjusted his glasses. "Anyway, what were we talking about again? And what are you doing here to begin with?"

Fuyuki's expression changed again, and he went back to looking cheerful. "Oh, I was looking for the glasses that I lost, when I heard voices from the forest. So I followed the sounds into this clearing, and found you drowning."

Kululu looked confused. "But… I was… at the bottom of the pond…?"

"No… you were kind of floating at the top."

"Oh." He turned away slightly. "So… um… then… but you still kind of saved my life, though."

Fuyuki paused a moment to take this in. That was right, he'd saved Kululu on multiple occasions. Kululu therefore was technically indebted to him. _Indebted_.

"So…" Kululu's voice became a bit quieter. "I suppose I do owe you my thanks for that…."

"Nah, it's okay." Fuyuki waved his hand dismissively. "You would've done the same for me—"

Kululu gave him a look.

"—or… not… since it would probably be physically impossible, due to proportions… but you would try!"

"No I wouldn't," said Kululu, as if this was obvious. It was a lie to himself. Somewhere deep inside, he knew that he probably would. "I would just let you drown, ku ku!"

"Nah, I think you would save me."

"All right… _maybe_ I would… after watching you struggle a little while."

They both laughed at this for a second, then stopped abruptly. Drowning wasn't as funny as they thought it was.

A brief glance passed between them. Kululu rubbed his arm awkwardly.

"So… this is a nice place, isn't it?" Fuyuki craned his head upward, admiring the beautiful wildlife in the clearing.

"Yeah. I come here sometimes."

He looked toward him. "Oh? You do?"

Kululu nodded, and then cleared his throat. "Usually to get away from you."

He didn't know why he was telling Fuyuki this, especially since he'd previously told himself that he wouldn't. But now that he was, there was no sense in holding back the rest of it.

Kululu paced around, as though he were an expert of the place. "It's kind of a habit of mine, I guess. I'm stuck with a person I don't particularly get along so well with, I get annoyed, and need somewhere to escape to." He stopped pacing and looked toward the pond. "I guess this is sort of… my place."

"Your… place?" Fuyuki bit his lip, feeling guilty that Kululu sometimes found him annoying. But he knew the guy needed space sometimes, like anyone else.

"Mm-hm. Do you ever feel like that sometimes?" Kululu sat against the edge of the pond and slipped his hand into the water. Fuyuki was sitting behind him, looking over his shoulder. Both of their reflections were buried under the deep aqua hues, undulating with the ripples that Kululu's hand had caused. "Like you need to just get away… and be by yourself…?"

"Yeah." Fuyuki took a small breath, which he expended into a sigh. "I know what you mean."

"Yeah." Kululu nodded, sitting back. "Huh. Something tells me that we really don't like being near each other, ku ku ku ku!"

"N-no! That's not what I meant."

"Ku ku. Don't worry, I know." He felt a bit hesitant at saying the next thing, though he didn't particularly know why. Fuyuki would want to know, anyway. "Turned out, I wasn't actually alone."

"You weren't?"

"No." He shook his head. "Got a visit from the spirit lady."

"You did?!" Fuyuki was listening intently now.

"Ku ku, yup. She was the one who put me underwater."

"Aw! That's mean!"

"I know. What a jerk, right?" he said smugly. "Ku ku ku."

"But I'm sure that if we talked it out with her, she might understand. Or… we could just leave her alone…." Fuyuki seemed disappointed at the latter idea.

"Nah." Kululu shook his head again. "Y'see, that's the thing. I think she's kinda lonely. But here the two of us are, going off on the island by ourselves…. If even we are having problems with each other, then we'd be no help to her."

"Well… we can try…?"

Kululu glanced over at him. "You just wanna hang out with a spirit, don't you?"

"N-no…." Oddly, Fuyuki blushed.

Kululu burst out laughing.

"Wh-what's so funny?"

"Ah, so that's it! Ku ku ku. Wow, I didn't know you were interested in those types of women, Fuyuki. Momoka's going to be jealous~"

"Um… you didn't just imply that Nishizawa-san's interested in spirit women too, did you…? I mean, not that I am, but…."

"Ppfft. No." Kululu wiped a tear from his eye. "Don't worry, Fuyuki. There are plenty other weird things you can hang out with."

He perked up. "Like the Island Beast!"

"Well, no, I was actually talking about…." He swatted his hand. "You know what, forget it." Kululu drew his knees up to his chest. "And seeing as the island beast you're talking about isn't actually real…."

"Wh-what do you mean…?"

Kululu looked him in the eye. The glint of light off his glasses almost gave him a frightening look.

"Fuyuki… the island beast is _me_."

Fuyuki jumped back. "Wh-what?"

"Uh-huh."

"No way! You don't look like a beast!" Intrigued yet terrified, he put his hand on his chin and thought. "Unless, you've actually been hiding your true form all along…. Tell me, Sergeant Major! What's really behind those glasses of yours?"

"Wh? Th—Eyes! Just eyes!" Kululu's hands slumped in front of him, trying to get Fuyuki to understand.

"No way! But how else could you be a beast?"

"Because, I…." He sighed and sat back down, turning away slightly from Fuyuki. "I'm just… I don't know… I…." He ran a hand up the side of his forehead. "Some… some Pekoponians might think of it differently. I believe they call it… having 'issues.' "

"Issues?"

He nodded, swallowing. He still couldn't decide whether to tell Fuyuki. It would probably freak him out. But nevertheless, the boy needed to know. "Sometimes…" he said, "when I'm alone… I get bored."

"Yes?"

"So… then I find some sort of animal…"

"…Uh-huh?"

"And I trap it…"

"Okay…."

"And pin it down…."

"…Um…?"

"And I kill it."

Fuyuki blinked, not knowing what to say. He breathed some air through the side of his mouth, making a strand of hair fly up in the air. "Well, okay then."

"Yeah." Kululu cleared his throat again and hugged his knees closer to his chest.

"Um… that's nice…?"

Kululu was surprised. "Really?"

"Uh, no. Sorry."

He looked at the ground.

"It's still okay, though, Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki tried to comfort. "Though… I do feel sorry for the animals, but… we all have to have some way to manage our emotions, right?"

"I… guess so…." Kululu didn't seem so convinced.

"And although your way might be very…" He searched for the word. "…unique, I still think that it's okay…. I mean… you know?"

"Not really."

"Yeah." Fuyuki's shoulders slumped. "But… there's one thing that I am worried about. If you've been killing rabbits for fun, where are we going to get our food?"

"Oh. Simple enough." Kululu stood up, gesturing to a rabbit that just ran past. "Rabbits are everywhere here. They're pretty dumb as far as animals go, too. Very easy to catch."

When he saw Fuyuki only gave him a look of incomprehension, Kululu tossed a stick indifferently toward where the rabbit had run off to and he sat back down.

"I… I'm sorry." He tried to hide his face in his hands. "I haven't ever told anyone these things. Ever."

"It's fine, Sergeant Major. I—"

"So between you and me, I'd like to keep it that way, with the exception of yourself."

The glint of glasses again. Fuyuki swallowed.

"As you can probably tell by now, you probably didn't mistake me for some 'island beast' for nothing, ku-ku. I could probably pass for one quite easily if I chose to."

Fuyuki began to understand. He never though he would, but he was starting to.

"And keep everything to yourself? Hoping others fall for the impression that you're not someone they should be around?"

"Actually, yeah. That's pretty much what it is, ku ku."

Fuyuki pressed his eyebrows downward. "No. I won't allow it, Sergeant Major."

"Eh?" Kululu looked at him. Now it was he who didn't seem to understand.

"Well…." Fuyuki twiddled his index fingers together. Kululu's gaze was on him. He breathed out with a determined air.

"Sergeant Major, it's okay to want to be off on your own sometimes, but I think that I'm worried. You said the White Spirit was lonely, right?" he asked him. "And then she went and tried to drown you in the pond." He held his hands out to Kululu. "And I don't care what you say, but… I'm not going to let you go on like this. You don't need to hide it. I won't let you be lonely, too, all right, Sergeant Major?"

Kululu glanced at Fuyuki's hands. Then he looked up at Fuyuki.

"What?"


	18. Need to Escape

_"__I won't let you be lonely, too, all right, Sergeant Major?"_

Kululu was still in quite a state of disbelief at the boy's words. He didn't believe anything that had happened that day. Fuyuki came out to him, he offered him his friendship. Kululu told him something that normal people would have freaked out about, and yet Fuyuki didn't seem to mind, and instead accepted it as a fact of Kululu's nature.

_Maybe… I was wrong about Fuyuki,_ Kululu thought. It was unlikely, but… very possible at the same time. Maybe he'd struck gold. Maybe Fuyuki wasn't like other people. Maybe this boy could actually, somehow, someway, be a friend to him.

_Who needs friends, anyway?_ Kululu flopped his head to the side as he lay down on the sand. He happened to see Fuyuki, who was wading in the water, attempting to spear a fish. He saw Kululu, smiled, and waved. Kululu frowned and looked the other direction.

He hadn't spoken to him that much after Fuyuki's bold suggestion, but it didn't hinder him that all. When they did speak, it had mostly been about surviving on the island. Admittedly Kululu felt ashamed of himself, as though he had left something hanging, some loose string that needed to be tied up between them. But he didn't know what to say to the boy. He didn't know how to speak to him like that after what they'd both said.

The issue regarding the signal fire and how it would be lit began to resolve itself. Kululu allowed him to use his last, solitary pair of glasses, since the other pair still wasn't anywhere to be found. As for meat, Kululu was no longer killing rabbits out of boredom, but killing them instead for food. Fuyuki thought this was a big change. Kululu didn't really care.

Fuyuki had started to (attempt) to learn how to spear fish in the water. He'd gotten the sticks, sharpened them up, replaced the points with rocky spikes when necessary. First he'd started out practicing how to spear fruit, which was a lot easier than spearing fish, especially since fruit couldn't swim. After (somewhat) mastering that tactic, he'd moved onto fish. He had caught a few occasionally, but none that were any bigger than his hand.

Neither knew quite for sure how much time had passed that they had been on the island. In the beginning, when they had first arrived, they didn't keep track, since both of them thought for sure that they would be rescued soon. But seeing as that felt like it had happened so long ago when they thought that, Kululu took up the task of marking dashes on a tree for each day that went by, plus the ones from the beginning that he could remember. So far, from the few dash marks that he had accumulated, it added up to almost an entire week and a day that had gone by.

Even so, there was nothing to be worried about. After the incident of Kululu almost drowning again, things changed for the better for both of them. The island took a large change, also. Food was in abundance. Fruit hung juicily from trees everywhere, waiting to fall. The many coconuts that they had mostly used up in the beginning due to their need for something to drink were now growing back, all along the beach. Their fishing-hole was always full in the morning.

Kululu could no longer bring himself to be mad at Fuyuki for certain things, however much he tried. The glasses thing was just a simple mistake on the boy's part, and it could easily be forgiven. He stopped feeling so lonely, even if often he tried not to speak to him. Both of them knew he would give in eventually, however much Kululu didn't want to think of that.

Things were looking better for the both of them. Gradually, they both forgot their woes, and the island started becoming just a bit more fun to the two of them.

"Look! Sergeant Major, look at this!" Fuyuki ran to Kululu, holding up a large sea bass. "I actually caught a fish! A really big one, too."

The fish flopped around helplessly in his arms, which Fuyuki quickly solved with his spear. Killing animals for food was becoming a lot easier for him. The trick was not to think about it and just get it done with.

"Wow," said Kululu. "Looks kinda tasty. Wanna cook it?"

"Yeah!"

They started up the fire with Kululu's remaining pair of glasses, keeping the flames enclosed in a tight spot by surrounding them by numerous stones. They had to prop up the bass using two sticks, since it was so large. They both watched in anticipation as the fish cooked, its scales curling slightly in the heat like katsuobushi.

Fuyuki's mouth begin to water with the memory of the delicious okonomiyaki back from home, topped with that delicious auburn sauce and the katsuobushi. A sudden thought struck him, something that hadn't passed his mind before. He began realizing just how long—

"And… here we go." Kululu took the roasted fish off the fire and tore the sticks apart, breaking it in two. He handed Fuyuki the part with the head of the fish, where the eyeball was, knowing that Fuyuki needed the nutrition the most, since he had the bigger body.

"Oh… uh, thanks, Sergeant Major!"

Fuyuki forgot what he'd been thinking about and instead bit into the fish. Bass was delicious. A little bit of oil trickled down his chin, and though he really wished he had some sort of napkin, he made do with wiping it away with the back of his hand.

It was a beautiful day on their island. Not too hot, though not at all cold, either. The temperature was just right. The sun, free from all clouds to hide it, beat confidently down upon the sea, brightening the tips of the waves with sparkling white highlights.

"Don't you love it?" said Fuyuki, in the midst of their silence.

Kululu swallowed a bit of bass. "Not really."

He knew that Kululu wasn't at all a fan of wilderness, and that was fine. But it must have been hard for him to deny certain things about the place—that their island was beautiful, and that they were so lucky to have landed in the tropics. And how food was everywhere for them. On a day like this one, they probably couldn't have gone hungry if they tried.

Fuyuki could probably get used to it. He had gotten more used to nature than he was when they first arrived there, that was for sure. It was calm. It was peaceful. And it was pretty cool, too, considering the white spirit that they had witnessed a few times. Yet, there was something that just seemed out of place….

Fuyuki tossed his stick away into the water, finished with his portion of sea bass. He was full already; it was such a big fish. Tired with thoughts and with the energy he'd used up catching the fish (it took a lot of work), he flopped down onto the sand on his back, staring up at the sky, and the seagulls that flew overhead.

_Must be so fun to be able to fly,_ he thought, his eyes squinting slightly from the sun's angle.

A realization dawned upon him. He bolted up.

"Sergeant Major! What day is it?"

"Hm… I think it's somewhere around the twenty-fifth," he answered.

Fuyuki groaned and smacked his forehead with the palm of his hand. "Mom said we'd have to be home by the twentieth! Oh, no…. I'm going to be in such big trouble…."

"Ku ku ku." Kululu put his hand to his mouth and laughed. "No big deal. If anything, this is better for us."

"What do you mean?!"

"Well, look at it this way: Everyone in Japan expects you to have been back five days ago. But you weren't, so they must have gotten concerned, and started looking for you. And since you never made it to Mumbai, they—"

Fuyuki cut him off as he groaned again, covering his forehead in agony. "Oh, no! I've forgotten all about Mumbai, too!"

"Hey, don't worry about it." Kululu put a hand on his shoulder. He needed to calm down. "There's nothing we can do about it anyway. We're stuck here until someone—"

"We're going to be stuck here forever, aren't we!"

"No, no we are _not_." Kululu narrowed his eyes. "They're going to find us eventually. Mumbai's going to have to wait—in fact, it seems to be that you won't be going." He held up his hands. "I'm sorry, Fuyuki. You've missed your chance."

"But—I never asked for this to happen!"

"I don't think anyone did." He shook his head in acceptance. "It just couldn't be helped. You have to acknowledge that."

"I—I—I don't want to!"

"Look." He peered sternly at Fuyuki. "Everything's going to be fine. This is _me_ saying this to you, all right? I'm usually a pessimist. But sooner or later, we're going to be found. All you have to do is not think about it." Fuyuki opened his mouth for a moment, but Kululu went on. "So far, you've been doing a great job of not thinking about everything that other people expect you to be doing right now. All you have to do is keep your mind off of Mumbai or going back home, and before you know it, we'll be out of here, lickity-split."

Kululu had been saying the same thing before, when they'd first arrived on the island. But that was around eight days ago, and they were still stuck on the place. Suddenly Fuyuki's situation no longer seemed so fun and happy.

"But… but… I promised Yuusho that I'd come to Mumbai for him." Fuyuki looked up at Kululu from where he was sitting. It was a pathetic look, like one that puppies gave when they wanted something. "Yuusho thought I would be there. Now he must think that I was lying."

"He does not—"

"I don't want to let him down, Sergeant Major. And then Mom. Mom's going to hate knowing that we crashed in the ocean and were able to find an island to live on purely from luck. She's never going to let me go on a trip like this again."

"That's not what matters at the moment, Fuyuki. We need to—"

"We need to get back home!" He gave him a desperate look, full of loss and confusion. "We need to go back and tell everyone what happened. We need to get them to understand."

"No, we do _not_ need to do that." Kululu tried to emphasize it for him. They didn't have time to worry about what was going on back at home. Perhaps they did, earlier back, but now was too late. He knew the look in Fuyuki's eyes. It wasn't a safe one.

"I just…" Fuyuki ran a hand through his bangs and fell to the ground in anguish. "I can't believe that I've forgotten about home and Mumbai this whole time."

"Fuyuki." The severity in Kululu's voice was increasing.

"Someone went missing, Sergeant Major! If we don't make it to Mumbai, I'll never be able to help them! I'll never be able to know if he was found…. I promised them I'd come! I told them I would."

"But you can't help it now, Fuyuki. Because you're stuck here, on this island!"

Kululu had him by the collar of his tattered shirt now, the material balled up in his hands as he tried to get him to see the point in all of this.

"It's not just fun and games anymore, Sergeant Major." His eyes narrowed. He gently pulled Kululu's hands off his shirt. "This has gotten serious. We _need_ to find a way back."

"No, we need to find a way to get _you_ back, Fuyuki."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I mean, something's wrong with you. You're not thinking straight."

Fuyuki looked hurt. "I am thinking straight!"

"There's nothing to worry about. You were fine with this place two seconds ago." Kululu looked at him concernedly. "What's gotten into you? It wasn't the bass, was it? No, it couldn't have been the bass."

"It wasn't the bass," Fuyuki said.

"Then what?" He moved closer to him. "What was it?"

"I—" Fuyuki's voice caught in his throat. He pushed Kululu away from him.

Kululu didn't understand.

"I—I'm sorry, Sergeant Major, I…." Fuyuki covered his eyes with his hand. He stood up and began running across the beach.

Kululu's eye ridges met downward in worry, and he hurried along to follow him. Whatever Fuyuki was thinking, it couldn't be good.

He felt like he was following the kid all around the island. It seemed to last forever until Fuyuki finally came upon the grassy top of the cliff on the other side of their beach, the one with rocks all over its underside.

"I can get away from here!" Fuyuki shouted into the wind. Kululu presumed that he must have seen him, because he didn't normally talk to himself so loudly. "I'm going to swim away. I can do this!"

"Fuyuki, no!"

Kululu darted forward, just as Fuyuki was ready to launch himself off the edge of the cliff.

He grabbed fast on Fuyuki's wrist, refusing to let go. "Fuyuki, you idiot! What are you trying to do, kill yourself?!"

Fuyuki looked downward at the far-off ground. Some rocks directly under his feet tumbled to the sand below. He knew that he would have fallen, if Kululu wasn't grasping his wrist so hard.

"I—I don't know… I just wanted to get to Mumbai…."

"Fuyuki, Mumbai's on the west side of India. You're not going to be able to get to it by swimming." His tone of voice softened. "What happened to your common sense?"

Fuyuki shrugged. His face was red and choked-looking. Kululu took him by the hand.

"C'mon, let's go back to the beach. No reason to get upset on the edge of a cliff." He glanced behind him. "The ground here doesn't look all that sturdy, ku ku ku…."

"Okay…."

Kululu walked him away from the edge of the cliff, like a father with a sleepy child who wanted nothing more than to go home and lay down in bed. When they arrived back at the beach, Fuyuki sat down in the suspended chair of sticks and leaves that they'd made. He watched as Kululu quietly tore apart small plants and fed them to the flames. Neither of them spoke.

Fuyuki was staring at his feet. He let out a sigh. He wanted to get back home, but he knew that he had been thinking to rashly. Kululu probably wasn't so pleased by his actions. He just didn't know what to do.

"Hey, kid."

Fuyuki looked up.

"Help me put out this fire, all right?"

"…Okay." Fuyuki placed his feet back down on the sand and abandoned his seat in the suspended chair. His shoes were filled with sand. Silently, anxiously, he wished that they could get back home soon so he could get some new, clean shoes. But maybe he couldn't do even that, if they never were able to get back home. Everything had started off as good and just spiraled down to worse.


	19. The Changing Moon

After the incident subsided, Fuyuki began to calm down, but it was still hard to take his mind off of everything that they could have been doing if they weren't on the island. He knew that Kululu didn't want him to keep thinking about that, though. And even so, both of them secretly knew that there were still some things about being on the island that Fuyuki didn't regret, however dangerous the place could be.

Fuyuki filled up a coconut husk with seawater and tossed it onto the flames of the fire. He forced a smile. "Uh, sorry for my outburst earlier…."

Kululu rubbed the back of his neck. "Eh, I guess it's okay…."

"Really?"

He shrugged, flinging another bit of water onto the fire. "Yeah. I guess I can understand why you're so impatient. Admittedly, I've had enough of this island myself, ku ku ku." He squatted, poked a last burning ember with a stick. "You know, ready to go back home, or however much of a home it is to me…. Ready to get back to my inventions, and forget about all this surviving-on-a-deserted-island nonsense."

Fuyuki gave a friendly laugh. "Yeah, I think I'm ready to go back home, too. I miss everyone."

The fire was out now. Kululu tossed the empty coconut shell across the sand, where he'd be able to find it later.

Fuyuki sat down on the sand. At this point he no longer cared about tearing up his trousers. When they'd first arrived at the island, they were white pants. Now they were beige shorts, splattered with grass stains and dirt, and covered in sand. All his clothes were threadbare and had holes in some spots from where bugs had chewed. It was disgusting, but at least he didn't have to go naked. Like Kululu. …Although that did seem a whole lot easier at times.

Something occurred to him. "Hey, Sergeant Major."

"Yeah?" Kululu went down on the beach with him, laying on his side. He picked up a twig and started tracing swirls in the sand.

"Let's be honest with each other: When we first came here, neither of us really liked each other, right?"

"Yup," he said bluntly.

Fuyuki laughed again. "Yeah. But…." His lips shut in a gentle smile. "I think that… that's changed a bit, hasn't it?"

"Ku. Dunno."

"Don't you feel like… like…."

"Like we don't hate each other as much anymore?"

His shoulders slumped. "Yeah. Like that."

Kululu shrugged. "I suppose so…. Ku ku ku. But what does that have to do with anything?"

"Well…." Fuyuki quickly glanced to the side. "When we leave the island… do you think… we'll still be okay with each other? Like… maybe even sort-of friends?"

Kululu thought. He put his hand to his chin.

"Ehhh… no."

"What? Why not?"

"Ku ku. I told you, I don't make friends," he said to him, almost smugly.

"But—" Fuyuki couldn't understand. All that they did… all that they'd been through on the island… it was only around eight days, but still—why didn't Kululu consider them as friends?

Kululu's voice broke through his thoughts. "Ku ku, at least I can be thankful for one thing, though."

"What's that?" asked Fuyuki.

"You're finally over your anxiousness. Or at least I hope so, ku ku ku."

Fuyuki looked down at his hands, which were no longer shaking. Kululu must have been right. His mind wasn't set on the issue of getting back home or to Mumbai any longer, though the thought of them still stressed him out a bit.

"Well, I'm just going to have to pull through this until the end, right?" he asked Kululu. Fuyuki struck a dramatic pose by placing his hand on what little biceps he had and clenching his fist. They both laughed for a while.

The day passed quickly for the two of them. There wasn't much else to do except eat and build stuff out of what they could find on the island and try and keep their minds off of going home, although both of them were surely daydreaming of it.

When evening arrived, they sat around the small fire on the beach, their faces illuminated by the light of the yellow and orange flames.

"Sometimes my father used to tell me stories from Mumbai," Fuyuki told him. In front of the fire, he had on the sand a few small pebbles, which he and Kululu were using to play tic-tac-toe with.

"Really, ku ku ku?" Kululu placed his twig middle-center. Fuyuki was stinking at this.

"Yeah…." Fuyuki breathed out dreamily, thinking of those good times when his father was still there. "He used to travel to Mumbai sometimes. And then he would come back and tell me what he'd seen. So many cool things…." He seemed lost in thought as he put down his next pebble. "So I've always wanted to go there."

"Ah." Kululu moved his hand below him as he placed his twig. "Ku ku ku, I win!"

"You—what?" Fuyuki looked downward. "Aw, man! That's not fair!"

"Oh, it totally is." He cleared the stick-marks out of the sand. "All right. No more tic-tac-toe tonight, ku ku ku, since it seems I'm always winning anyway."

"But—but… I've always been able to beat my sister at this game," Fuyuki lamented.

"Eh. Well." Kululu put his hand to his heart and shut his eyes. "Some are just naturally better than others."

Fuyuki tried to give him an angry smile, but it didn't work. He ended up laughing instead.

"Okay, I agree. Tic-tac-toe isn't so fun anymore."

"You're just saying that because I keep kicking your butt at it, ku-ku!"

They laughed awhile, and ended up flopping down on the sand, staring up at the stars that were slowly appearing above them in their summer positions.

"What was that elusive father of yours like?" Kululu suddenly asked.

Fuyuki thought about this. "I guess he was…. He was nice. He always told me the right thing to do, and he always had something interesting to say." He searched for some way to explain it. "You know, like… one of the things you just don't quite get as a kid, and when you're a bit older you still don't quite get, but you know that it's somehow important?"

Kululu furrowed his brow. "Um… I… think?"

"Yeah. Well, that's what he was like." Fuyuki breathed in, and then out. "But he was… really mysterious. There were some things that he wouldn't tell us, just keep them from sis and me. It was as if there was something going on that we weren't allowed to know." He turned over on to his side, now facing away from Kululu. "Whenever we asked Mom about him, she never said much, either…."

"Mm, that is pretty weird," Kululu agreed. He hugged his knees to his chest. "At least your mom was okay, right?"

"Yeah. Mom's great."

He nodded. "Yeah. Aki's pretty nice…."

Fuyuki glanced over his shoulder at him. "What was your mom like, Sergeant Major?"

Kululu gave a dismissive shrug of his shoulders. "My mom… was something else. She was pretty wacked out."

"Well… how so?"

"I guess she was just… a really odd person." He put his elbow behind him, leaning his head slightly against his shoulder. "As far as I regarded her, I always felt like she never was much of a mother to me. I was always fooling around with technology, making new things… and she never stopped once to take a glance at my accomplishments. I was always a baby in her eyes."

Fuyuki covered his mouth, laughing slightly. "I think a lot of moms are like that."

"Oh. Probably. She must certainly fit the stereotype of 'a lot of moms,' then, ku ku."

As he spoke of the mother he disliked, Kululu frowned. Eight days earlier he wouldn't have told Fuyuki something like this. Now… he didn't mind so much. He felt like the boy was allowed to know, and he didn't mind telling him.

Fuyuki was lucky. Even before the island, Kululu had known this, and had wanted to let him know that somehow. Although he himself had never felt like his mother had ever cared for anything he did, Fuyuki had a mother who did. He was still young and had a lot of his life ahead of him, and so far it was all pointing toward the road of happiness.

_I wonder… if I had been in Fuyuki's place, would things have been the same for me?_ he thought briefly. A seed of doubt entered his mind. But the thought left, just as quickly as it had come.

"So. Yeah. Ku ku. Mother stories. Probably boring to you."

"No, not really." Fuyuki turned his head. "It's interesting. I've never known these things about you."

Kululu didn't know whether that was good or bad.

"Did you have any brothers or sisters?"

He paused. "Yeah."

"What were they like?" asked Fuyuki.

Kululu thought. He really wasn't quite sure how to describe them. "They were… okay, I suppose." He narrowed his eyes in a displeased expression. "P-perhaps maybe I liked them a bit… and when I was really little, I wanted to hang out with them a lot."

Fuyuki giggled. "Aww."

Kululu clicked his tongue to the roof of his mouth. "But the same thing sort of happened with them. I was too young for them. They always wanted to play with each other instead."

"Always?"

"Always." Unexpectedly, it all began pouring itself out. Kululu couldn't help what he was saying anymore. "It only got worse when I skipped through a couple of levels in training school."

"Levels?"

"They're like grades. But that brought up some problems between me and the two of them. I was put in level seven, the same as them. They _hated_ me. They despised me for that."

"Oh…." Fuyuki bit his lip. "I'm sorry about that."

"They even watched, uncaringly, when I discovered for myself what the older kids did to children in their level who seemed smarter than them."

"So…." Fuyuki blinked, trying to think of what he meant by that. It hit him. He dragged himself to a sitting position, suddenly understanding what Kululu had been put through, and he felt sorry for the guy. "They… bullied you?"

"Eh, pretty much." Kululu tossed his hands indifferently in the air. "Ku ku. Wherever you go in the universe, kids in school are always going to be the same. Just a fact of life…."

Fuyuki lay back down. "That sounds…. That sounds horrible, Sergeant Major! Though, when I was in elementary school, I guess some kids tried to do the same to me, because I was easy to pick on… but my sister beat them up instead." Fuyuki shivered, hugging his arms in fright. "She was scary when she did that."

"Ku. Yeah." Kululu took a small breath to calm himself. "Natsumi's… your sister's okay, too. She can be a real moron sometimes, but… she's not horrible."

_I see…._ Fuyuki wondered if that was a compliment for his sister. It sure sounded like it, especially coming from Kululu.

"Wow, you… you sure are kind of sensitive deep down, aren't you, Kululu?" Fuyuki asked him.

"What?" Kululu pushed his glasses back up his nonexistent nose. "I—um, _no_. Ku ku ku."

Fuyuki expelled another soft laugh. The guy sure didn't act like it, but even Kululu had to have some bit of normalcy in him.

He turned his head back up toward the stars. It seemed so bright out tonight. The sky looked beautiful.

"Hm. Ku ku ku."

"Huh?"

"I can sure imagine that." Kululu put his hand up to his mouth, laughing cynically. "Little Fuyuki, droning on about occult… and the big bad older kids don't like it. Ku, ku ku ku ku ku!"

"Hey! It's not funny!" Fuyuki rubbed his arm bashfully. "I was pretty obsessed as a kid. …Ha. Glad I'm not like that anymore, though."

Kululu decided not to break the truth to him, not when he sounded so certain of what he thought was right.

"Augh." Kululu flopped his arms out on the sand. "You should've been living in _my_ hometown."

"You mean the one where everyone was mean to you?"

"Well, yes, but… ku ku, there were so many weird things going on there, you would have loved it! …(oddly)."

"Whoa! Really?" Fuyuki was rapt now, bending forward to listen.

"Mm-hm." Kululu nodded. "There were a lot of strange things that happened, but since I was a kid, it never had all that much of an impression on me. People went missing all the time, strange creatures appeared, rumors were spread, places were haunted, everyone was always talking about some different sort of ghost wandering around in the schools…. One time, there was even some crazy kid who ran an army tank through the school and blew it up, ku ku ku!"

Fuyuki recoiled his head. "That… sounds… dangerous. …Did it ever get fixed?"

"Oh, yes, eventually. They wanted the kid who blew it up to partake in its repairs, which stunk, ku ku ku." He shrugged his shoulders. "But hey. They deserved it, right?"

"Um…." He knit his eyebrows. "What about the other stuff? The things that… weren't so painful to children."

"Hm. Okay." Kululu thought. "Well, the missing people. I told you about my parents already, ku ku. They vanished after awhile, and my siblings couldn't find them _anywhere_."

For a moment, Fuyuki could've sworn he saw a playful sort of smile flash across Kululu's lips.

"But you probably would've _loved_ the place. Knowing you, and how paranormal activity flocks your being, you would've had a great time. Ku ku ku!"

"Yeah! I bet it was awesome!" Fuyuki agreed.

"Hm, not actually, though." He put his hand to his chin. "Well, except the time that everyone said they saw a ghost inside the janitor's closet in the school. _That_ was a fun experience, ku ku. I urged them to go on ahead and look inside for the ghost. The idiots! They actually did. I locked the door right behind them. They couldn't get out for the rest of the day, ku ku ku!"

_That was kind of jerky,_ thought Fuyuki as a sweatdrop rolled down the side of his face.

"There was also the haunted park, too." He looked off to the side. "Have some _really_ weird memories with that one…."

"What did you see in it?" Fuyuki wondered. He loved ghost stories like these.

Kululu voice lost its cheery tone. "Not much. I went inside of it a few times, because, well, who _wouldn't_ go in a place that was haunted? Ku ku. Wasn't like there would be anywhere else there!"

"A wise decision." Fuyuki commended him. He would've gone directly into a haunted park, as well. Too bad Oku-Tokyo didn't have any.

"But, turned out, there was. Some other kid apparently had the place before I did."

Fuyuki's eyes lit up with excitement. "It was a spirit, wasn't it!"

"What? I haven't even gotten to—Well, yeah. She was." Kululu inhaled and exhaled again, slightly blowing across the sand in front of his face. "I didn't know that at first, though. So we kind of… we sort of became friends. I guess that was how it was." He paused. "It was actually… the first time I had a friend that I didn't totally screw up with…."

Fuyuki gave him a funny look, but dismissed this. Kululu's childhood friend…. For a split second, he almost saw a glimpse of the child part of him that was still somewhere there. "And then what?" he asked, still wanting to hear the story.

"And then… one day," Kululu continued, "when I went to the park… she was looking really angry, and she told me out of nowhere, 'I'm the spirit of this place, so you better leave, or else I'm gonna have to curse you!' But I was kind of like, 'Yeah, okay, whatever.' You know? Didn't make a difference. Ku ku. She seemed kind of relieved anyway, so…."

Fuyuki listened to Kululu's voice as he told the story. Yet he couldn't take his mind off of the white spirit on the island. The girl in the story reminded him so much of her….

"I think she was lonely," said Kululu. "The place was haunted. Everyone else was so freaked out about it that she'd probably never seen anyone else around her age. Ku ku ku. Guess I kind of felt the same, since I had been moved up so many levels…. Admittedly, I was a bit lonely too…."

His voice became quieter now. The visions from his story danced in Fuyuki's mind. Becoming friends with a spirit…. What would that be like?

_I wonder if he still feels lonely,_ thought Fuyuki. _After all that, things still probably haven't changed much for him._ In his mind, he gave a soft, one-syllable chuckle. Maybe Kululu even acted like a jerk… because he was just too afraid to get close to people. Kululu had just always been sort of a creep to him, but maybe he was wrong.

For a short moment they exchanged a sort of eye contact, when Fuyuki sort of understood, and then Kululu went back to plucking his fingers across the sand.

"One day, I came to the park and she was getting ready to leave. I wanted to say goodbye to her, but… I didn't. And before I could do anything else, it was already too late. And then she vanished…. Ku ku ku. Guess that was pretty much the last I saw of her." Fuyuki watched him, puzzled, but Kululu stood up and took a bow. "The end, ku ku ku!"

Not knowing what else to do, he slowly clapped.

Then he stopped. "Wait—that's not a very happy story!"

"So what?" Kululu lowered his eye ridges. "This ain't story time, Fuyuki. Ku ku! It was a spirit in a haunted park. What did you expect?"

Fuyuki shrugged. He honestly didn't know.

It was night, and although Fuyuki didn't feel all that sleepy, his thinking process was notably different from how it usually was in the daytime. Of course he was interested in Kululu's story about some little girl involved with paranormal activity, but somehow he wasn't able to make the connection that Kululu was now comfortable enough to tell him about his first real experience in having a friend… and possibly why he was no longer looking for one.

"It kind of reminds me of that white spirit," he brought up. "The one on the island."

Kululu bit the edge of his upper lip. "Hm. Yeah, I guess so."

"Yeah. You don't seem very surprised by that."

"No, not really. I'm kinda sleepy right now," he lied.

They both shared a sigh, one of weariness at the day's ceasing. Fuyuki let out a yawn and stretched his arms up into the air.

"So, what? Are you gonna sleep now?"

"Yeah, I think that's a good idea." Fuyuki rubbed at his eyes. "Well, see you in the morning, Sergeant Major. I'm going to have some nice dreams of occult tonight."

"Ku ku. See ya too."

They waved to each other, and Fuyuki headed off to the shelter. Kululu remained at the beach, where he watched the waves crash with no meaning.

He wasn't sleepy. He usually stayed up most nights anyway, even back home. And earlier when they'd arrived on the island, perhaps it was the truth that he did get sleepy rather often. But he couldn't sleep that night. He couldn't at all.

Something was tugging at the back of his mind. Something about the missing people….

_Did they really just disappear?_

There had to be more than that. There had to be some reason behind it. People just didn't vanish out of nowhere, unless they were spirits, which his parents were not. He knew that they were somewhere out there.

And wherever they were, he deeply wished that they would stay in that part of the universe, and never come to find him again.

He didn't need sleep. But it would be nice to try and get some, even if it was for naught. Kululu lay back down on the sands, using his elbow as a pillow.

Watching the beach, hidden amongst the dark of the trees, was a white figure. The faintest hint of a smile found its way onto her lips. She faded away, and then appeared on the beach. A coccoloba grandiflora leaf was in her pallid, lucent hands, which she laid across Kululu's body, and then glided away.


	20. Crazy

**Okay. I actually DID have a reason this time for not updating! My kitty was sick and we were trying to figure out what it was. Yesterday I was struggling to get her to drink, and this morning I had to take her to the vet. So these past few days I've been sort of focusing on her a lot.**

**And if you're one of those crazy people who think that cats aren't worth all that much trouble, well, then, you're crazy!**

* * *

Kululu had a pounding headache. He didn't know why. All he wanted to do was lie down somewhere and wait till the pain subsided.

He tried to do this, tried to see if it would work, but the pounding just got worse and worse. He didn't know why, nor how he got it. It had no explanation, and no one could have predicted this happening, but it was eating him up and he needed to do something about it.

Was he feverish? He didn't know. He'd thought that the effects of the mushrooms had long since worn off. Maybe they hadn't, though. Maybe they were still trapped in his system somewhere, like tiny little parasites awaiting the moment that they could tear his mind into pieces.

The world to him started spinning. All the colors of the island blended together, in one horrid mess. It was all so blurry, a smudge of nonsense; and at the same time, everything was clear to him. Everything finally made sense. And he hated how it did.

The pounding was harder now, like one of those annoying taiko drums. It wouldn't stop. Each time it pounded it was harder and harder.

Kululu fell to his side on the beach, gripping his head in agony. He began to writhe. All he wanted was for the pain to stop. Heck, could it even count as pain? He felt nothing. And yet it was still there, tearing at him, ripping out the insides of his brain.

"Um… Sergeant Major?" A figure was leaning over him. He didn't know who it was at first, since it was standing right under the sun, its features blocked out by an undertone of shadow. The figure rested its hand on Kululu's shoulder. "Sergeant Major, are you all right?"

"Don't touch me!" he snapped, slapping away the hand that was reached toward him. Kululu ran across the beach, desperate to get away from the figure.

Fuyuki frowned. What was wrong with Kululu? Was he just acting weird again?

Needles. Tiny needles prickled all over Kululu's skin, as if he'd just rolled over a hundred times across a field of cacti. They were under his skin, aching to get out. He grabbed his wrist. He could feel the blood oozing through his veins, the strong pulse sending tremors through him. His whole body shook. He didn't know what was happening. Was Fuyuki right about an island beast? Was there actually such a thing, and it had been him all along, just waiting to get out?

Kululu headed back to his hiding spot in the middle of the forest. He needed to make himself think clearly. He ran at full speed, not caring if he tripped over anything at all, till he made it to that familiar clearing. He dashed toward the edge of the pond, where he caught himself, and peered into the water. He saw his reflection. His reflection was normal.

But slowly, the reflection changed. It started morphing—at first in flashes, and then in thick swirls of muck, changing him till he looked like something else, something that had never been him.

Kululu shook his head, trying to flick the images away. When they wouldn't leave, he dunked his head underneath the cool liquid, in desperation to cool himself off. He knew that there was nothing wrong with him. There shouldn't have been. So why did he feel so awful?

He took his head back out of the water, gasping for breath. He was shaking again. It was cold, but hot. Not like being sick. Being sick made you hot on the inside and cold on the outside. He was cold on the inside and hot on the outside. He felt like he wanted to vomit, but he knew that he had no need for that. He just wanted to run off and keep running until there was no more running left to do.

"Sergeant Major! I found you!" Fuyuki poked his head out from in the trees. Kululu's eyes shot wide open. Fuyuki. What was Fuyuki doing there?

Fuyuki picked up Kululu by the waist and began carrying him back to the beach. "Sergeant Major, are you all right? You're acting a bit strange."

Acting a bit strange? Yes, yes, he was acting a bit strange. Kululu knew this; he could not deny that. There was no reason for him to act strange. No reason at all. And yet he was. He needed to stop acting strange. He needed to do so many things. So many things to do! But not while he was still dreaming. He felt like he was having a nightmare, but was still awake.

_Dammit… get a hold of yourself, Kululu!_ Kululu clenched his forehead with his hand, pressing down on the skin with his fingers until his head felt sore. _You're not supposed to be acting like this! Just calm down!_

Every time he thought a simple thought like that, it was taken away from him, like crabs in a tide. They started appearing less and less frequently in his head. All he knew was that he needed to get away from something, he just needed to get away.

_But what do I need to get away from?_ he wondered. Slowly, his eyes went up to Fuyuki, who had finished carrying him back from the beach. Get away from the person who had helped him this far? Who would willingly take care of him? Did he really need to get away from this boy?

Yes, he decided. Yes, he did.

Kululu swerved to the side, breaking free from Fuyuki's arms. Fuyuki gave a cry and followed after him. He grabbed him again and walked back to where they had been standing.

"I'm sorry, Sergeant Major," he said. "I really am. But you're acting strange, and I can't leave you by yourself." He gave a friendly smile. "Besides, you did the same for me, remember?"

Kululu didn't register what was happening until it was too late. He was being trapped! Fuyuki was ensnaring a vine around him so that he couldn't leave!

"What are you doing," he said in a quiet voice, which rose to a much louder level. "What are you doing!"

"I'm sorry, Sergeant Major."

He really did look sorry. But Kululu wasn't looking at his face to have been able to know this. His eyes flew everywhere, frantic, panicking. His mind was moving at a faster speed than his body was. He wanted to sprout wings and fly away. He wanted to leave. He wanted to get off this freaking island already. Like Fuyuki. Fuyuki seemed to be leaving. Where was he going? Why was he walking away?

Something was controlling him, but he didn't know what. But it wasn't himself. He knew that he couldn't control himself at all.

He couldn't take it anymore. Not any of it. Anything and everything encircled him in his black vortex of abyss, squeezing him and squeezing him until it was tighter than the vines themselves.

Kululu looked down into his hand. There was a sharp rock in it. He knew how to escape. He knew how to get away from Fuyuki.

Rapidly, he began sawing at the vines with the rock. Slowly they fell apart around him. Kululu made his way to the pile of weapons that they had built, and he selected the longest javelin. It was only fair that he take the larger weapon, since he was bigger. And maybe Fuyuki could have something too, so that they could at least fight as equals when he escaped the boy. Kululu picked up a sharpened rock, fashioned in the shape of a knife, and headed toward Fuyuki.

Fuyuki was sitting on the beach inconspicuously. Kululu waited in the bushes, planning how he would strike. Fuyuki turned his head away from Kululu. Now was his chance!

Kululu leapt out of the bushes, flinging himself into the air. Fuyuki turned around, startled, and even more so when he caught sight of the javelin in Kululu's hands.

"Fuyuki!" Kululu said in a mocking, unstable voice. "_Fight me!_"

"I—What?" Fuyuki shook his head, thinking that he must be dreaming.

Kululu tossed him the rock-knife. Thinking it would get lost if it was lying around on the sand like that, Fuyuki picked it up. Kululu took this as his cue to lunge.

"Hold on! Wait, Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki backed away. "I don't want to fight you! I don't even know how you got free from your ropes in the first place!"

"You tried to imprison me," Kululu said, hatred dripping from his voice. "You tied me up and you abandoned me. You know I _hate_ it when people do that!"

"Sergeant Major!" he pleaded. "Just listen to me! Something's wrong with you right now…. You have to cool down!"

"I've done enough cooling down." Kululu lowered his eyes into a glare. "That's what I've been doing the whole entire time on this stupid island! Trying to do that one frogging thing, but then I have to look after you, too!" He poked him aggressively with the blunt side of the javelin, then turned it around. The point was nearing Fuyuki's chest.

Fuyuki leapt back, crawling onto a tree stump for safety. "Sergeant Major! This isn't a good idea. We have to make sure that neither of us get hurt!"

"No. I'm going to make sure that _I_ don't get hurt. And you"—He stuck the point at Fuyuki again.—"can do the same for yourself."

There was something wrong with Kululu's voice. Fuyuki could hear it quite clearly. Kululu lunged toward him again, the point of the javelin dangerously close to Fuyuki's body. Instinctively, he grabbed the rock-knife and made a gash in the side of the javelin.

"Good, good." Kululu began to give his signature laugh. "Now fight me!"

"But neither of us fight, Sergeant Major!" There was pain on Fuyuki's face. "Please, stop this…."

He lunged at him again. Fuyuki stuck out his hand and grabbed the end of the javelin that was pointed toward him, but Kululu unexpectedly swished it away, causing Fuyuki's palm to have a large gash in it. Blood began to ooze from it, and Fuyuki's breath hitched in fright. He looked at Kululu. He couldn't understand why he was doing this.

Kululu swung the javelin at Fuyuki again. Fuyuki's other hand tightened around the rock-knife and he ducked out of the way of the flying stick. Kululu went behind him to retrieve his weapon, and as he did so, Fuyuki was able to get an opening. He went behind Kululu and was about to grab him, but Kululu turned around and pointed the javelin at his eye. Startled, Fuyuki's hands twitched away from him, and he took a couple of quick steps backward before he was harmed.

They moved around an invisible circle, eyes trained on each other, one waiting for the other to make his move. Fuyuki was clearly the larger person. He had the advantage. So why was he so afraid? Maybe it was the look in Kululu's eyes. He couldn't even see his eyes because of the glasses, though. Fuyuki was terrified, though he wasn't quite sure of what.

Fuyuki knew it suddenly. Kululu wanted to kill him. A strange fury arose in Fuyuki. He couldn't let himself die, nor could he let either of them be killed. He had to protect both of them. But right now, he wanted to protect himself more. And there was only one way he could think of to do that.

Suddenly, they both lunged toward each other at the same time. Fuyuki pinned Kululu to the ground, though Kululu's javelin was still aimed dangerously up at Fuyuki's neck. Fuyuki had his rock-knife pointed at Kululu's eye, while his wrist was caught by Kululu's small hand. They stared at each other, both with the same look in their eyes, and both with the same wish.

The tension was increasing between them. Fuyuki tried to bring the point of his knife closer to Kululu's eye, but Kululu was gripping his wrist too hard to let him. He tried to shove the javelin more toward the boy's neck, but Fuyuki had him pinned down good. They were both caught by each other. Fuyuki had the advantage of size, but Kululu knew quite well what he was doing, and he knew exactly where to make the cut to end it all for Fuyuki.

All of a sudden, Kululu paused. He stopped struggling, and the look on his face softened. His eyes widened. So did Fuyuki's. They let go of each other, and both sat up on the ground.

They both had conquered it. They had defeated themselves.

"What were we doing?" Kululu asked him, his hand on his forehead.

Fuyuki shook his head. He couldn't speak, not while his voice was caught in his throat.

Kululu's hand went to his mouth as the realization hit him. "I was about to kill you…."

"And I was about to kill you, too," Fuyuki finally said.

They both looked at each other in utter fear and confusion. Then, they did something unexpected.

They fell forward and hugged each other, enveloping the other in their arms.

Fuyuki cried. Kululu shut his eyes, squeezing them tightly closed. Neither could believe what they were just about to have done.

"Sergeant Major," Fuyuki sniffled, "let's never do that again."

"Yeah…."

Kululu didn't quite know what to say. He knew that it had been his fault. But it was over now. Whatever it was that was controlling him, he had finally defeated it. It was the second time he had snapped like that, but this time, no one was killed.

Kululu relaxed his eyelids, then inhaled through his nose, expending the breath in a slow sigh. It had been forever since he'd been hugged. He knew it wasn't a hug of gratitude or of caring towards him, but one of thankfulness. Regardless, it still was nice to know that getting hugged for him was possible.

He pushed himself off Fuyuki. "Wait, no."

Fuyuki looked confused.

"Let me see your hand."

Fuyuki showed him his hand. Kululu shook his head.

"The other one."

He showed him his other hand. Kululu lifted it up in his fingers, examining the deep gash that he had caused. He sighed again. "We need to get this healed…."

"Yeah…." Fuyuki gave a casual nod.

"I—I'm sorry…."

It was a swallowed sound, like Kululu was halfway crying. He cleared his throat.

"We can wrap it in some scraps from your sweatshirt, but unfortunately, I'm afraid that I don't have any first-aid kits with me…."

"That's all right." Fuyuki gave him a forgiving smile.

Kululu glared slightly. "Why are you doing that?"

"Uh, doing what?"

"…Being so nice to me…."

Fuyuki smiled again, this time an understanding one. "Well, because when I was about to do something scary, you helped me out, too."

Kululu tilted his head slightly, remembering this.

"And I know that it probably wasn't your fault. What can you say? It's a deserted island. We were both probably doomed to loose it eventually." He laughed slightly, one quick syllable from relief. "And now you've overcome it, so there's nothing left to worry about."

Kululu couldn't believe it. This boy made him feel as though it wasn't actually his fault for snapping on him. He didn't think that there could be anyone like this that existed. Now he knew that he was wrong.

He looked downward. "Thanks, Fuyuki…."

Fuyuki smiled again. "No problem, Sergeant Major."

"We should go treat your wound, now."

"Yeah, you're right. Okay."

Kululu wasn't feeling so awful anymore.


	21. Rescue & Epilogue

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA LAST CHAPTER. I can't believe it. Like. Whoa. I won't be updating this thing anymore.**

**I need to stop procrastinating on writing all those other things I said I'd write, I know. I keep telling myself I'm going to write and I don't, but I really need to if I want to get anything else ****_done_**** this summer.**

* * *

The next few days were a lot easier for both Kululu and Fuyuki. They no longer fought, or kept things secret from each other. From then on there was no more snapping, no more hatred, and there was nothing to be afraid of.

Their anxiousness was at a minimum. Talking to the other was no longer something to be dreaded. Without even noticing it, they began to even enjoy being in the other's company. Things were suddenly a lot friendlier between them, an unspoken bond that the two had accidentally created without knowing it.

Kululu was more silent than not around Fuyuki, though this time Fuyuki knew why. He was still feeling guilty about the wound in his hand. All the while Fuyuki tried to dismiss this, saying that it didn't hurt all that much, but it really did. All he could hope for was for it to heal before it had time to get infected. It wasn't that deep, but it was still painful enough to keep him up during the night.

Kululu was checking Fuyuki's wound often, which Fuyuki felt uncomfortable with at first, but was then brought to a shocking realization about Kululu. He was simply concerned for the boy's well-being, and felt sorry for what he'd done. With this in mind, Fuyuki smiled to himself. He had known Kululu was good deep down… although maybe a bit deeper down than most would have assumed.

As the days passed, thoughts of being rescued were fleeting more and more from their minds. Things were settling back to the way they'd been before Fuyuki's outburst. There was one day for the two of them in which all of that changed.

Kululu had been roping up their stash of leftover fruits and nuts, hidden in a husk made of leaves and fastened onto a large vine, when he paused in the middle of his work.

"Something the matter, Sergeant Major?" asked Fuyuki.

Kululu was silent a moment before speaking, and said, "It's that white spirit again. I just saw her pass through the trees."

"Really?" Fuyuki scrambled in Kululu to catch a glimpse of her, but now the ominous woman was nowhere to be seen. She had already vanished. Fuyuki's shoulders slumped, and he slowly walked back to where he'd been laying on the beach.

"Who is she, anyway?" Fuyuki said aloud to himself.

Kululu tightened the vine above him. "The spirit of the island, I think. Ku ku. Or at least, that's what she said."

Fuyuki jumped to a sitting position. "You spoke to her?"

"Yup." Kululu nodded proudly. "Right before she tried to drown me."

"…Oh." After that he became silent again, and laid back down.

Fuyuki breathed a sigh between his lips, streaking the back of his hand against his forehead. It was really hot. And he was really bored, too, which only made it worse.

"Hey, Sergeant Major." He peered up at him. "Is there anything left to do today?"

"I dunno." Kululu gave the vine one last yank and walked over to Fuyuki. He sat down next to him. "We already started up the signal fire, right?"

"Yeah." Fuyuki gestured to the fire blazing on the mountaintop.

_Right. I should really know this,_ thought Kululu. He adjusted his glasses on his face, then cleared his throat. "All right. So we've got the signal fire up and running… we've secured the extra food stash… the shelter is fine… the weapons are propped up where they're supposed to be…. Hm. Guess there's nothing left to do, after all."

"Nothing?" Fuyuki let out a groan. "Well, can we at least go into the forest? I'm _really_ hot…."

"Ku ku ku, I don't think I'd agree! But Momoka might…" Kululu joked.

"I—I didn't mean—"

"Ku ku ku! All right, come on." He stood up.

"And wait, what do you mean by—"

Fuyuki got up to follow him. Kululu was already way ahead of him, already slipping in through the entrance of the forest. He sprinted to catch up, only a few long strides until he was walking alongside the yellow Keronian.

"Have you ever climbed a tree before?" Kululu asked him.

"Uh… no."

"Ku ku, well, now's the best time to learn."

Kululu grabbed the low-hanging branch of a deciduous tree and stood atop it. He reached his hands above him to grab the next branch, then lifted himself up on that one. It looked easier because Kululu was smaller, but Fuyuki thought he might try too. He grabbed one of the higher branches and lifted himself up (it took a lot more arm strength than he had imagined), groaning as he did so. Finally, he managed to slump his shoulders over the branch. He panted, waiting a moment, and brought the rest of his body up with it. He was surprised to find that he was a lot stronger now than he'd been a week or so ago, when they'd first arrived on the island.

Fuyuki marveled at his feat. "Wow! Look, Sergeant Major! I made it to the first branch!"

"You're gonna have to do a lot better than that if you wanna _really_ climb the tree, ku ku!" came a voice from above him. Fuyuki looked up to see Kululu many branches above him. How did he get so high so fast?

"We'll see about that!" he challenged. Speedy-quick, Fuyuki scrambled up another branch. He became pretty tired after that.

A few leaves sprinkled onto his head from above. "What was that about us seeing how you could climb the tree?" Kululu's voice taunted. He was even higher now.

Fuyuki followed up after him. Each time he got higher and higher up the tree, until there were no more branches that he could reach to lift himself up on.

"Okay, Sergeant Major." He gave a laugh. "You win."

"Ku ku ku, so I do."

With his finger, Kululu pointed downward. Fuyuki looked at him funny, not quite understanding what he meant by this gesture, until he peered down. He was so high off the ground! He hadn't even realized it till Kululu pointed it out.

"Ack!" Fuyuki grasped his head in fright. "How are we going to get down?"

"I dunno, ku ku!" Kululu put his hand to his mouth, laughing at his misfortune. Fuyuki tossed him a playful glare and lowered himself off the branch he was on, swinging on it by his hands. The tree, luckily, was sturdy enough that it didn't shake.

Fuyuki laughed again. "Whoa, this is actually really fun."

"Ku ku, I know!"

He paused. "Hey… Sergeant Major?"

"Yeah?"

He smiled. "You're actually a pretty nice guy, aren't you?"

Although he didn't know why the boy had asked this, Kululu stared at him a moment, thinking about this. Then he shook his head, an ironic smile on his lips.

"You keep thinking that, and you'll find yourself in a heck of a lotta trouble, kid."

"Will I really?" he asked.

"Promise."

Fuyuki knew what this meant. He was slowly beginning to understand the language that Kululu spoke. Kululu held out his hand to him, and Fuyuki hoisted his shoulder back onto the tree branch to outstretch his own hand.

A whirring sound appeared above them.

"What's that?" Fuyuki gasped. His head shot upward. Was it…? Yes, it was! Circling above their heads was a (noisy) helicopter! …That happened to be pink.

"Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki gasped. He couldn't believe it. And at such a time…. Was this really possible? "It's Nishizawa-san!" he shouted over the ruckus of the blades.

"…Oh." Kululu's expression changed back to normal. He recoiled his hand. Something told him that he knew that this would happen.

Despite the loud distraction that the whirring of the helicopter blades created as it soared above them, Fuyuki couldn't help but notice Kululu's apparent change in attitude. "Sergeant Major? Is something wrong?" he asked.

"No. It's nothing." Kululu began lowering himself off the branch. "C'mon, we'd better get off this thing if we wanna go back home."

"Yeah, okay." A rush of excitement went through Fuyuki again. Going back home. Finally. It almost seemed too good to be true, like this was something that wouldn't actually ever happen, something that they only told themselves to feel better about the whole situation. But now it was really happening.

Fuyuki glanced downward, gulped, and then mustered all his strength and courage to help him get down the tree, one branch at a time.

When they made it to the bottom of the tree, and hopped down onto the forest floor, they saw that the Nishizawa helicopter had already landed some place on the large beach.

"Come on, Sergeant Major!" Fuyuki waved for him to hurry along. "It's time to go home!"

They were both excited, undoubtedly. They ran to the edge of the forest, about to make their way onto the beach. Almost there…. And then everything would go back to normal. Something suddenly struck Fuyuki. He almost felt… as if he didn't _want_ to go yet. As if he wasn't quite ready. Like this wasn't supposed to happen. It was wrong somehow, and yet he knew that he had to go back home.

Kululu seemed to have the same thought. They both paused, standing at the edge of the trees.

"So… this is it, huh?" said Fuyuki.

Kululu gave a slight nod of his head. "Yeah. This is when we leave."

They both knew what that entitled. Things would return to the way they were, and they might act like the whole thing never happened. Fuyuki didn't want that.

"You know, Sergeant Major…" Fuyuki was facing away from him, still looking toward the beach. "…if there's anything else that happens, you can always, you know… come and talk to me…."

"Yeah…."

This was all that Kululu had to respond to this. A prolonged moment passed between the two when neither said anything.

"Erm… Fuyuki…" Kululu finally said.

"Yeah?" Fuyuki glanced over his shoulder at Kululu.

They shared a brief moment of eye contact. Kululu opened his mouth, about to speak, but then he cast his eyes off to the side.

"Uh…. It's nothing. Just… best of luck with Momoka, all right?"

He furrowed his brow. "What do you mean by th—"

Kululu gave him one last casual wave, and headed to his left, in the direction where the beach continued to stretch along the island.

Fuyuki's eyebrows lowered. Kululu was about to say something… but what? Did he want to stay on the island or something? Then why didn't he answer? Did Fuyuki mess things up for them again? He was still scratching his head in confusion when he exited the trees and set foot on the sands.

"Fuyuki!"

Before he could do or say anything, a stampede of people rushed toward him. Everyone was there! His sister, his mother, Keroro, Momoka, and everyone else. He was swallowed by the wave that engulfed him.

"Ack! Guys! I—need to breathe!" Fuyuki struggled to say.

"Fuyuki!" His sister glomped him and squeezed his shoulders worriedly. "Mom and I were _so_ worried about you!" She took a breath, fighting back tears. "Don't you _ever_ do that again!"

"Oh, Fuyuki!" His mother came from behind him and hugged him as well. Fuyuki felt as though he was suffocating.

"Mumbai!" he finally broke in. "Mom, did you hear any news from Mumbai?"

"Yes I did," said his mother. "Things are going just fine. Was there a missing person? Well, he's been found! There's nothing to worry about at all." She ruffled Fuyuki's hair, and he breathed a sigh of relief. That was one thing less to worry about….

His eyes went to where he'd last seen Kululu. They followed along the edge of the trees till he found the guy wandering on his own far-off on the beach, waiting for all the commotion to stop so they could just get back home, most likely.

Fuyuki's expression dimmed down. He looked kind of lonely….

"Fuyuki-dono!" Keroro ran up to him and hugged him around the neck. Tears were streaming overdramatically down his cheeks. "It was so lonely without you! Do you have any idea how long you were gone?"

Momoka plowed through and punched him out of the way. "GET OUTTA HERE, YA LOUSY FROG! YOU'RE HOGGING MY TIME WITH FUYUKI!—Oh, Fuyuki-kun! How I've missed you!" She hugged his arm, nuzzling it affectionately with her cheek. "We were all so _worried_ about you! The second we contacted your friend in Mumbai, I started up a search party right away to find you!~"

"Th-thanks, Nishizawa-san!" He smiled in gratitude. "But the Serge—"

"Fuyuki-dono!" Keroro looked hurt. He pointed to the bruise on his cheek. "Momoka-dono just punched me."

"Uhh, that wasn't very nice, Nishizawa sa—"

"Hey, Fukkie! Eat this chocolate! It'll make ya feel better!" Tamama crammed some chocolate into Fuyuki's mouth.

"Whoa! Thanks, Tamama," Fuyuki said while chewing. "That is pretty yummy. But I think the S—"

"You've got a lot of explaining to do." Natsumi cracked her knuckles. Then she stopped. "But still, I'm… pretty amazed! You've been living on this island all on your own, for almost two weeks!" Her expression softened as she took in his image—messy hair, tattered clothing, cuts and bruises all over his skin. His cheekbones were prominent and he almost looked… stronger, too. "How in the world did you do it?"

"It _is_ rather commendable," Giroro commented, his arms crossed over his chest. "Especially for someone like you, who has no past experience with survival training."

"My brother's awesome!" Natsumi blurted.

Momoka nodded eagerly, agreeing. "Oh, he is! I'm just so happy he's all right!" She hugged him again, this time around the waist, making Fuyuki feel awkward with all the praise.

"But I had help—" he tried to say.

Keroro interrupted him. "Hey, Fuyuki-dono…. Wasn't Sergeant Major Kululu with you on this trip?"

"Actually, yeah, he was."

Momoka stopped hugging him. Keroro scratched his head.

"Where is he now…?"

* * *

Kululu was off on his own, at a separate part of the beach. He sat casually on the sand and watched the waves crash and topple onto each other. All he had to do now was wait… until all the attention for Fuyuki died down, and they were finally allowed to go back home.

He glanced briefly over his shoulder, then turned his head back. Sure enough, they were still all there, as happy as ever to see that Fuyuki was alive and well…. It almost sickened him, all the happy-feeling-ness. Or perhaps it wasn't so sickening, but rather something else to him. Fuyuki was a good kid. Whenever something good happened to him, he always deserved it.

Kululu almost released a sigh. He supposed Fuyuki and him weren't so alike after all. He looked back out at the waves, allowing his eyes to fall shut.

Suddenly, he was lifted from the ground by two arms.

Kululu furrowed his brow. "What th—"

"Kululu-san!" A cheek nuzzled against his head. "You could say, happy to see you?"

That was a familiar voice….

"Mois?" Kululu turned himself around in her arms. Angol Mois was behind him, his entrapper. Saburo stood beside her with his hands tucked in his pockets.

"Hey, bro." He waved once toward him, smiling casually. "Good to see you're okay."

"I—" Kululu's voice caught in his throat. He didn't know what to say. Why were they here? Scratch that—why should they care?

"What—Why—How…?" He searched for something to say to them. He had nothing.

"It was kind of boring without you," Saburo explained to him. "We realized after a while that you guys weren't coming back from Mumbai. So we gathered up the search party and started looking everywhere to find Fuyuki-kun and you."

"You could say, disaster!" Mois said dramatically, sounding as if it was the worst thing that could possibly happen.

"You were… worried about me?" Kululu didn't believe it. But they both nodded. He was thrust into even more disbelief.

"Hey—wanna head back to the helicopter now?" Saburo suggested.

"Yeah…." Kululu realized that it came up rather quiet. He glanced up at Saburo, who smiled at him, signaling that he had understood.

"Well then, let's go." Saburo began walking off.

Kululu leaned forward to follow him, but realized he was stuck. "Hey, Mois." He crossed his arms, an irritated look on his face. "Can you put me down now?"

"Oh! Right." She placed him on the ground, then began walking to the beach as well.

Kululu followed along after he felt certain that he was no longer grinning.

* * *

"Hey, look! There he is!"

Keroro jumped up and down enthusiastically, pointing toward Kululu, who was walking up to them.

"Sergeant Major!" Keroro darted forward with open arms. "How 'bout a hug for your awesome captai—"

Kululu placed his hand on Keroro's face and pushed him away. He crossed his arms and leaned against the outside of the Nishizawa-copter. "So, now that we're all here finally, are we leaving or what?"

"Yeah, that sounds good," said Fuyuki with a nervous laugh. _Although…._ He had a strange feeling, as if he was forgetting something. He couldn't remember what it was, so he just dismissed it. _I'm sure I'll remember later._

One by one, they made their way into the helicopter, which became packed with so many people, but it was big enough anyway. Momoka, regrettably, had to be squeezed up against Fuyuki's side (much to her delight). Following this pattern, everyone was forced up against the person they liked best/wanted to make feel most uncomfortable.

The trip back home was not as long as Kululu or Fuyuki had expected. They were almost saddened at how short it was, feeling that Oku-Tokyo hadn't been that far away from the island after all (which it wasn't).

Fuyuki gazed out the window as the helicopter took off into the sky, his cheek against his shoulder, which was pressed against the glass. There were a lot of memories on the island. Even if it was a little less than two weeks, and even if most of those memories were bad ones, he would still be leaving it all behind. He might never return again. Now he would be back to his normal life, his normal tasks…. No longer having to worry about survival… or getting to know Kululu….

Fuyuki squirmed his arm away from the window and scratched his head. He still felt like he was forgetting something.

Alone on the island, gazing toward the sky until the helicopter could no longer be seen, was the ghostly white figure of a woman.

_They're all gone now,_ she thought to herself. Now the innocent blue-haired boy and the funny yellow frog would never come back. It was over now, all done. She was alone again.

She peered down into the palm of her hand, in which she held the lost pair of glasses.

The fire still blazed behind her on the mountain.

* * *

Fuyuki arranged his bed sheets, breathing out a sigh. It would be a relief to finally be able to sleep in an actual bed again. And although the island was quite the experience for him, there were some things he missed about his regular life—hygiene for one thing. The shower he'd just taken was the most magnificent thing that had ever happened to him. He was also able to brush his hair, clean his teeth, and clip his nails at last. The wound in his hand had also been taken care of as well, after a long visit to the doctor to make sure that he was now in good health, and the pain had finally ceased.

His bed was finally made. Fuyuki prepared to lay down into it and savor the feeling of warmth and comfort. He was about to jump on in when he sensed a presence outside his room.

Fuyuki stood up and went to the door, which he opened and poked his head through. Kululu was standing by it, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.

"Sergeant Major?" Fuyuki smiled and stepped outside his room. A slight smile was on his face. "Can I help you?"

Kululu glanced up once at him. "I never did say what I was going to tell you on the island, did I?"

"No." Fuyuki took a breath, still smiling, and shook his head. "You didn't."

He opened the door wider. Kululu stepped inside the room, and Fuyuki shut the door slowly behind them. It made a small click as it closed, though it didn't lock.

The moon shone above them all, the largest light in the sky. For a second it seemed that something white passed over it—but as shortly as it appeared, it vanished all the same.

* * *

**Yes, I did it. I don't know how I did but I DID. I actually ENDED a story for once. Amazing, huh?!**

**Whatisthisamazingfeelingovertakingmysoul. Now I just have to edit this sucker.**

**Starting date: June 21, 2013**

**Completion date: July 2, 2013**

**LOOKIT THAT. I frogging wrote 52,000 words in 13 days. Woot! Take that, nanowrimo!**

**Oh wait… this isn't nanowrimo.**

**So... yeah, I'm pretty much taking up space down here because I know how much it sucks to go and type a review whilst reading a story and accidentally see the ending. Blah blah blah blah blah.**

**Any story ideas? Can't say I will write them (I still suck at requests, so that's why I don't take them DX), but I will at least consider what I could do with them. Especially ideas building off this story. Like. If you saw something you might want to see me write in more detail, or explore a bit with a certain concept. Because when I wrote this I probably left a lot of stuff out. So tell me if I did. TELEPATHY.**

**…Or maybe I just like reviews and like hearing what you thought about what I write. So sue me. XD**

**Well, nevertheless, I thank all of you for putting up with this for… that long, and I hope you enjoyed reading whatever it was that I wrote again! :D Thank you for your encouragement and all your thoughts!**

**That's right, I have all your thoughts. I keep them in a special jar…. Mua ha ha ha ha ha.**


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